Some people believe the ancient, mysterious, beautiful oracle called the tarot holds the secrets to life.

Miranda Malone isn’t sure.

But she’s about to find out…

Tarot decks feature seventy-eight illustrated cards, divided into two sections called the Minor Arcana and the Major Arcana. Originally, however, the tarot only contained the twenty-two cards of the Major Arcana. These cards symbolize people, situations, events, or even cosmic forces. Seen as a whole, they describe a journey from innocence to wisdom, sometimes called The Fool’s Journey. Each Major Arcana card—beginning with 0: The Fool and ending with 21: The World—depicts a stage of this journey and reveals an insight, lesson, or spiritual truth.

In Tarotica, Miranda Malone undertakes her own journey that winds across the United States. Along the way she encounters a colorful cast of characters who portray the cards of the Major Arcana. The first of these is Eli Hart, who’s dressed as The Fool when she meets him; he becomes her lover and companion on the journey. Each chapter of their erotic adventure corresponds to one card in the tarot deck. Miranda’s and Eli’s experiences and the people they meet during their trip guide the lovers on their path to self discovery and teach them the secrets of the tarot.

Join Miranda as she explores the mysteries of life and discovers her own erotic potential in Tarotica…

Miranda Malone watched a menagerie in sequins, feathers, and black leather parade down San Francisco’s Market Street. The Castro’s carnival atmosphere was more outrageous and exciting than she could have imagined. When a young African man dressed like a gumball machine invited her to drop a dime into his codpiece, she laughed and caught the handful of rainbow-colored treats that spilled out. Miranda knew plenty of unusual characters back home in Salem, Massachusetts, but none compared to these!

Even with the new purple streaks in her long dark hair, she felt a bit ordinary.

She’d flown to California three days ago to begin a cross-country journey she’d been planning for seven years. Originally she’d intended to take the trip right after graduating from art school. But then her father was diagnosed with cancer and she’d stayed home to care for him. Now, with the money from his life insurance policy, she could follow her dream.

A tall man wearing only body paint and a boa constrictor passed Miranda and wagged both his snakes at her. She shrieked with laughter. Three trumpeters with gold lamé g-strings strolled by. A masked man in a jester suit abandoned the parade and approached Miranda. Throwing his arms around her as if they were long-lost friends, he hissed in her ear, “Don’t scream.” Something hard jabbed into her ribs.

Before Miranda had time to react, the man hustled her through the crowd. “Do you have a car?” he asked and poked her in the ribs again. This time she saw the gun.

She nodded.

“Take me to it. And no funny stuff.”

Fear and anger surged in her stomach as the reality of her situation sank in.

Struggling to keep her emotions from clouding her thinking, Miranda tried to recall what one was supposed to do in a case like this. She couldn’t run—the streets were jammed with people—and if she yelled, this crowd would probably mistake her plight for some kinky foreplay ritual. If they could even hear her over the hullabaloo. She reached for her cell phone, but the man noticed and snatched her purse away. In San Francisco, a man carrying a purse didn’t even attract a glance.

When they came to the spot where Miranda had parked her rented Kia, she considered kicking the car hard to set off the alarm. But nobody paid attention to car alarms anyway, and she didn’t want to provoke the man in the jester suit while his gun barrel was nuzzling her bra.

He rummaged through her oversized purse and found the keys. Maybe he just wants the car, she hoped. But her hopes dissolved when he unlocked the passenger side door and shoved her in.

“Climb over,” he ordered. “You’re driving.”

She crawled over the console, banging her knee on the gearshift. Keeping the gun trained on her, the man got in beside her and fit the key into the ignition.

“Where are we going?”

“Just head for the Golden Gate Bridge.” He waved the gun at her. “Move it.”

Slowly she slid the car into the stream of traffic. As she navigated San Francisco’s famous hills, her mind scrambled for an escape plan. Suddenly she recalled one of those Read this: It could save your life! e-mails she’d received. Biding her time, she began scouting about for something big and solid she could ram the Kia into, launching the air bags and bringing police to the scene of the accident. Soon she spotted a concrete bridge abutment, aimed for it, and sped up.

“Hey, what are you doing?” the jester demanded, grabbing the steering wheel.

Miranda jerked the wheel as hard as she could and banged his other arm with her elbow, dislodging the gun. It toppled onto the console. Quickly, Miranda snatched it.

It was a toy.

A car blew its horn as the Kia swerved into the other driver’s lane. She pulled back into her own lane and slowed down, clutching the wheel to steady her shaking hands.

“What the hell?” she shouted and threw the plastic pistol at him.

With a sigh of resignation, the man removed his mask and the ridiculous hood with the jingle bells, revealing amber-colored hair, pale green eyes, and a face right out of a Calvin Klein ad. He smiled sheepishly.

“Please, I can explain everything,” he said, holding up his hands.

“Oh my God!”

Miranda’s heart banged against her ribcage, and she wasn’t sure whether the wild ride or the guy next to her had provoked it. She veered onto the shoulder of the road and hit the brake. As the car came to a stop, she seized his right hand. In the center of his palm, she saw a silver-dollar-sized tattoo of the Earth.

Her father’s strange deathbed prophecy rang in her ears: Your future husband will hold the world in the palm of his hand.

“Oh my God,” she said again. “Who are you?”

“Eli Hart.”

“Heart, as in love?” she asked, placing her hand over her own pounding heart.

“No, H-a-r-t, like a stag. I work at the Meditrina Vineyards in Napa. Or at least, I did. Now I’m running for my life.”

Miranda glared at him. “What did you do, steal the payroll? Poison your boss?”

“Of course not,” he said indignantly. “Hey, what about ‘innocent until proven guilty’?”

“So far, you’re guilty of kidnapping.”

“I apologize for scaring you. I only did it because I was desperate. I couldn’t use my own car. They’d have followed me.”

“Who are they?”

“It’s a long story.” He gave her that sheepish grin again and Miranda felt her heart skip a beat.

“High-concept it for me,” she said.

“Okay, I’ll try. Someone has been killing Meditrina’s grapevines by infecting them with a deadly fungus. I suspected the source might be foreign, so I took samples to a botany professor I know at San Francisco State. Turns out I was right. It’s a disease called Mort Jaune—Yellow Death—that until recently only existed in France. Now the bastards want to eliminate me before I can blow the whistle.”

“Why would anybody want to kill grapevines?”

“Listen, Ms…”

“Miranda.”

“Miranda, could we keep driving?”

Do I dare trust this man? Miranda asked herself. Cute guys had been her downfall before. And this one hadn’t behaved like a gentleman thus far. Maybe he really was in trouble, but helping him could endanger her, too. Still, he had that tattoo on his palm…

“What’s the story behind that tattoo?”

“I got it to honor Mother Earth. And my own mother as well—she was a dedicated environmentalist. She died two years ago. It’s sort of a talisman, too, I guess.

I’d hoped it would help me grow the best grapes in California.”

Miranda eased the car onto the highway. The whole reason for taking this journey was to have an adventure, she reminded herself. Be careful what you ask for!

“One more question. Why did you abduct me?”

Eli laughed. “If you’re going to kidnap somebody, it might as well be a beautiful woman.”

As San Francisco diminished in the rearview mirror, Eli pulled out his cell phone.

“Sybil, I’m in trouble. I need a place to hide out for a while… just north of the city… with a friend… thanks, see you soon.”

“Who’s Sybil?” Miranda asked.

“My mother’s best friend. She’s known me all my life, literally. She assisted at my birth.”

“Where are we going?”

“Mendocino. You’ll like it. It’s really pretty and low key.”

On the drive up the California coast, Miranda told Eli about her life as an artist in the historic Witch City. He told her more than she wanted to know about armillaria mellea root fungus, cylindrocarpon, “black goo,” and the other perils of the wine industry. The technical aspects of his work didn’t interest her much, but she admired his passion and his tenderness when he spoke of his beloved grapevines. Would he demonstrate such passion and tenderness toward a woman? she wondered.

After four days at Sybil’s isolated retreat, Miranda felt restless. Yes, it was beautiful and peaceful here. But peace wasn’t on Miranda’s agenda. A big country stretched before her, full of adventure, excitement, and interesting people. She’d been waiting seven years to take this trip and she didn’t want to waste a single minute. Who knew how long Eli might have to stay here, hiding from the bad guys who intended to destroy him like they’d killed Meditrina’s grapevines?

She liked Eli. And she admired his ability to remain cheerful in the face of danger—he insisted that if his days were numbered, he didn’t intend to spend them worrying. Someday he might become my husband, but I’m not ready for commitment yet, Miranda thought . I’ve got things to do, people to meet.

“You’re leaving?” he asked when he found her packing. “Are you mad at me?”

“No, but I really need to be on my way. There’s a lot I want to see and do this summer, you know.”

“Where are you going?” Eli asked.

Miranda zipped her suitcase. “For starters, I think I’ll drive up the coast to Oregon and Washington.”

“Will you miss me?” He took her in his arms and kissed her long and slow, his tongue playing for time.

“Of course,” she said when they came up for air. “But this isn’t goodbye. We’ll hook up again when it’s safe.” She ran her fingertips along the growing bulge in his jeans. “How about a quickie for the road?”

Eli pushed up her skirt and pulled down her panties. When Miranda stepped out of them, he held them to his nose and inhaled her scent. “I’m keeping these to remember you by.”

Giggling, Miranda started unfastening his fly, but he grabbed her hand. “C’mon outside.”

“It’s raining,” she protested.

He led her to her car and opened a back door. “Get in.”

“You want to do it in the car?”

“You’ll be spending a lot of time in this car—I want it to hold fond memories for you.”

As Miranda crawled into the back of the Kia, her skirt hiked up around her hips.

“I haven’t had sex in a car since high school, for good reason,” she complained. “We’d have been a lot more comfortable in bed.”

Eli slipped his hand between her legs, thumbed her clit, and slid a finger inside her. Instantly she stopped grumbling and spread her legs, giving him a good view of her pussy. As her fluids started flowing, he slipped in another finger.

“Are we having fun yet?” he asked.

“Mmmmm…”

With his other hand he unzipped his jeans, took out his cock, and stroked it. He’s ambidextrous, she mused. She rearranged herself so she could suck him while he continued fingering her slit. As his pre-come oozed into her mouth, he pulled a condom package from his pocket and tore it open with his teeth.

Miranda straddled him. Trying not to bang her head on the car’s roof, she rode him until she thought she’d split right up the middle. As she felt the familiar rush to the finish, Eli moaned and came with her.

Yes, I’ll definitely miss you. She climbed off and straightened her clothing. Maybe I should upgrade to an SUV.

Miranda saw the hawk circling a moment before she heard the drum. Following the sound through Seattle’s Green Lake Park, she came upon a man dressed entirely in black, sitting on a park bench and playing an African djembe. Auburn hair fell to his shoulders and a necklace of what looked like fangs hung around his neck. He glanced up as she joined the small crowd of listeners, smiled at her, and shifted to a lively rhythm that spoke to her in a language beyond words.

The beat resonated through Miranda’s body, and she swayed along with it.

Closing her eyes, she felt the sound swirling around her, filling her with such joy she could barely keep from laughing aloud. She heard a chorus of men chanting, a woman’s voice ululating. But when she opened her eyes, she saw no one singing. How odd, she thought. Again she closed her eyes, and again she heard the voices.

When the drumming stopped, the crowd applauded. Some dropped money in a coffee can near the drummer’s feet as they dispersed. Miranda started to clap, but ended up holding her palms together at her heart as if in prayer.

“Thank you,” she said.

“My pleasure,” the drummer answered.

“I heard singing.”

“Ah, good. They’re always here, but few people hear them.”

“Who?”

“The spirits of the drum.”

Confused, she shook her head to clear it. “When I arrived, you started playing a different beat.”

“Drumming is an ancient form of communication. Each rhythm has a meaning.”

He grinned, exposing even, white teeth. “When I saw you coming, I played the beat that announces the presence of a beautiful woman.”

Miranda looked up and saw the hawk still circling overhead. It seemed to be watching her.

“I’m Miranda Malone.” She held out her hand.

“Lancelot Lucas.” He took her hand in both of his, as if they were old friends. His eyes, golden like a jungle cat’s, mesmerized her and for a moment she lost awareness of everything else. A tingling warmth ran up her arms, into her chest, and she felt strangely lightheaded.

“Where did you learn to drum like that?”

“I studied with a Senagalese master drummer in Salem, Massachusetts.”

Astonished, Miranda said, “I’m from Salem. What a coincidence.”

“Perhaps.”

Now the tingling sensation moved up Miranda’s legs and nestled between them.

A soft fluttering, like a butterfly’s wings, tickled her pussy. What the hell’s going on? she wondered. Her knees began trembling and she sat on the bench, trying to get herself under control. The hawk swooped down and perched on the back of the bench near Lancelot’s shoulder.

Miranda stared at the bird in awe. “Oh my God.”

“This is Hermes,” he said, and the hawk bobbed its head.

Hoping she didn’t look as flustered as she felt, she asked, “What brought you here?”

“I came searching for a pyramid hidden in a mountain, where occult initiations have been held for generations.”

“Did you find it?”

“I did.” He smiled and his golden eyes flashed. “Would you like to see it?”

Won’t my friends in Salem be envious? She answered, “Yes.”

I must be out of my mind, following a strange man into the wilderness, Miranda scolded herself as she hiked uphill behind Lancelot. I can’t even get a cell phone signal out here. This is how women get murdered and never found.

Back in the park, the idea of exploring a magician’s secret pyramid had sounded like an irresistible adventure. Now, however, it seemed the height of folly. She was hot and tired, but Lancelot, who must have been fifteen years her senior, scrambled over boulders as sprightly as a boy. And that crazy hawk stayed right overhead, a sentry.

“Not much further,” he called over his shoulder.

She paused to catch her breath. Gazing at the magnificent landscape, she realized she would never be able find her way back to civilization.

Lancelot held out his hand. As she took it, a bolt of energy surged through her.

Instantly her fatigue and trepidation disappeared. He pulled her up onto a rocky ledge, then pushed aside some juniper boughs, exposing a steep path. “This way.”

After climbing about thirty feet, they reached an opening between two tall stones.

“Hope you’re not claustrophobic.”

Removing his backpack and pushing it ahead of him, Lancelot crawled into the opening. Miranda followed. Darkness swallowed them. Her hands and knees slid along cool, smooth stone; her head brushed the top of the tunnel. She tried not to think about snakes, spiders, and other creepy-crawlies. Listening to Lancelot’s scuffling up ahead, she wondered again what had possessed her to undertake this insane odyssey. As the tunnel narrowed even more, she had the peculiar feeling of moving through a birth canal.

“Don’t be afraid,” he said, reading her mind.

He stopped crawling and a light flickered, silhouetting his form. Suddenly a brilliant flare burst like a comet in the darkness, revealing a space before them. Lancelot stood up and lit another torch.

Scurrying into the light, Miranda gasped as she emerged into a vast pyramid whose peak reached three stories above her head. Twelve wrought-iron lanterns hung on the walls. As Lancelot lit them, chasing the chill from the room, she noticed the massive crystals circling the space and glowing with an eerie illumination of their own. The entire chamber appeared to be shimmering.

In the center of the room stood an ornately carved stone table large enough for a banquet. On its top rested two majestic candlesticks, one holding a black candle and the other a white one. She moved closer, her steps echoing on the stone floor, to examine the four objects between the candles. She’d lived in Salem long enough to recognize a witch’s tools: a magic wand, a jeweled chalice, a dagger, and a silver pentagram.

Lancelot joined her at what she now realized was an altar and lit the candles. Then he picked up the wand and carried it to one corner of the pyramid. Holding the wand as an extension of his outstretched arm, he walked clockwise around the room, pausing at each corner to draw a pentagram in the air. Light shot from the wand’s tip, so that when he’d completed his circuit, a wall of whitish fog surrounded them.

Weird, she thought, but cool.

As Lancelot returned the wand to the altar Miranda asked, “Are you going to initiate me?”

“If you like.”

“What do I have to do?”

He laughed. “Relax.”

With his fingertip, he traced a pentagram on her forehead. A wave of pulsing heat undulated through her body, making her tingle all over. Once again she felt the fluttering in her pussy, which quickly escalated to a powerful throbbing.

He’s casting a spell on me, she thought. Somehow the idea didn’t frighten her in the least.

From beneath the altar Lancelot dragged a long, red-upholstered bench. Suddenly, Miranda’s knees buckled and she sat down on it gratefully. He grasped her shoulders and studied her, his golden eyes blazing. “Are you okay? Sure you want to proceed?”

She nodded as another ripple of desire rushed through her. Despite the cool of the underground cave, drops of perspiration broke out on her forehead. His fingers drew a line down the center of her torso; when they reached her pussy, Miranda moaned and pressed against them.

With hands that seemed to be made of fire and ice, Lancelot undressed her. He’s certainly got the magic touch, she mused. As he lay her down on the bench she felt herself softening, opening to receive him. Her juices leaked onto the red upholstery.

When his fingers found her slit, she took them in hungrily. When his tongue tasted her clit she spread her lips to give him better access.

“Don’t come yet,” he ordered, removing his mouth and his fingers.

Miranda squirmed and whimpered in protest, pinching her nipples as she watched him undress. Except for the necklace of fangs. His body wasn’t as nice as Eli’s—a bit of a paunch, love handles. But when he exposed the biggest cock she’d seen outside of porn flicks, she sighed, “Oh my God.” Will that fit inside me?

He stroked it until white light glowed around it like a glistening sheath. That’s the strangest condom I’ve ever seen, she thought as he knelt between her legs and rubbed the swollen head along her wet seam.

“The magic wand is a phallic symbol,” he told her, easing his tip into her. “A wand should be at least six inches long, but only as big as you can comfortably handle.”

Miranda giggled and raised her hips, trying to take his wand deeper into her, but he held back. Teasing her, he slid the head in and out, stroking the hot spot just inside. As she felt her orgasm gathering, he pulled out.

“Please…” she pleaded.

“Not yet. Stay on the edge as long as possible. You want to build power.” He stroked her breasts and sucked her hard nipples, tantalizing her without letting her come.

The necklace of fangs brushed enticingly against her skin. He slid his cock, greased with her fluids, up her belly and between her breasts, massaging himself with her smooth flesh.

“Let me suck it,” she said.

She opened her mouth as wide as she could and Lancelot quickly filled it. Gently, trying not to gag her, he probed her hot mouth. Her tongue flicked the ridge of his head, her lips embracing as much of his thick shaft as she could manage. When his cock started to throb, he withdrew it and went back to tickling her cunt with it. Miranda had no idea how long the dance went on; she’d lost all track of time. After a while, however, she discovered she could maintain an intense level of excitation without succumbing. The sensation was exquisite.

Suddenly she noticed the rope he held: silky gold like drapery cord, maybe six feet long. She’d never been into bondage, but she couldn’t have objected even if she’d wanted to.

“Soon you can come, my pretty,” he told her, “and as you do, I’m going to tie knots in this rope. Then I’ll give you the rope and you’ll tie knots while I come. Understand?”

Miranda nodded and he thrust into her. Never had she felt so full or so inflamed.

When he hit bottom, she exploded in a kaleidoscope of colors. Wave after wave of pleasure washed over her. As soon as one orgasm ebbed another swelled behind it.

Lancelot busily tied knot after knot in the golden cord as she bucked and writhed beneath him, shrieking like a banshee. The pyramid echoed with her cries. Eventually the crashing force of her convulsions mellowed to a gentle throbbing and he handed her the rope.

As he sheathed his wand again and again, Miranda managed to tie several knots.

He groaned, stabbed a final time, and lay still. His heart hammered against hers.

When her mind cleared and his breathing returned to normal, Miranda asked,

“What’s with the knotted rope?”

Lancelot lifted himself off her and sat up. “You’ve just been initiated into one facet of sex magick. Sex generates tremendous power. The knots capture and hold that power. Take the rope with you—if ever you need extra strength, all you have to do is untie a knot.”

The sun had begun its descent when they emerged from the pyramid. Hermes the hawk perched on one of the tall stones, waiting for them. Racing against nightfall, they hurried down the mountain.

“Do you think you’ll ever come back to Salem?” Miranda asked as they drove toward Seattle.

“Perhaps. I’ll certainly let you know if I do. I’d enjoy teaching you a lot more about sex magick.”

Late one afternoon, a week after Miranda had departed, Eli came upon Sybil seated beside her scrying pond. He paused in the shadows of an oak grove, silent as a deer, not wanting to interrupt her. But she sensed his presence—he could never hide anything from Sybil—and turned toward him.

“Come here.” She patted the grass beside her. “Let me show you something.”

Eli knelt next to the silver-haired woman and stared at the emerald-green pond.

Dragonflies hovered like tiny helicopters above its surface. The sun’s rays spilled across the water like warm honey. The pond, he knew, served as Sybil’s magic mirror, reflecting images of the past, present, and future.

She leaned over the pond again and motioned for him to do the same. “Tell me what you see.”

“I don’t know, Sybil…” He squinted at the water. “I can’t see pictures in it like you do.”

“The pictures aren’t in it. They’re in you. The sparkling surface triggers your intuition. Be quiet and allow impressions from your subconscious to rise into your awareness.”

He tried again, without success.

“Don’t try so hard. It might help to let your eyes unfocus a bit.”

Eli cast his gaze across the pond and allowed his vision to blur. Patches of light and shadow slid across the water. As he watched, they converged to form what looked like mountains. Peering closer, he noticed two tiny shapes, moving. The scene grew clearer, enabling him to distinguish two people climbing the mountain: a man, followed by a dark-haired woman. Inexplicably he felt a spark of desire. Miranda? he wondered.

But before he could be certain, a breeze rippled the pond and the vision disappeared. It’s just my imagination.

“I got this weird impression that Miranda is mountain-climbing,” he said, still not believing what he’d seen.

“First impressions are usually right. That’s the creative side of your brain talking to you, rather than the analytical part.” Sybil patted his hand. “Don’t worry, Miranda’s well and having fun. You’ll be together again soon.”

He smiled at his lifelong friend, thinking that she epitomized feminine beauty.

“Before Miranda left, I asked her what she thought about you. She said you’re a MILF.”

“A what?”

“A MILF. It’s an acronym for ‘mother I’d like to fuck’.”

Sybil laughed. “And what did you say?”

“I told her you’re very spiritual.”

“Can’t one be both?”

Now Eli laughed. “I think she’s a little jealous of our relationship.”

“That’s only natural. We share a past that doesn’t include her.”

Eli turned and gazed into the pond again, hoping to recapture the scenario he’d witnessed before. This time, however, he saw the murky figures of two men in a white car. A pang of fear jabbed him. He tried to make out the landscape around them, but it was too blurry to recognize.

“They’re looking for me,” he said. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was sure the men in his vision were the ones who’d destroyed Meditrina’s grapevines.

“Yes.”

“Where are they?”

“I don’t know exactly,” Sybil answered, “but you’re safe here. For a while, at least.”

“I can’t put you at risk by letting you hide me. I’d better leave.”

He started to stand, but Sybil grabbed his arm and pulled him down beside her again. “Hold on. We’re not in any immediate danger.”

Eli sighed; his shoulders sagged under the weight of the fear and stress he’d managed to keep at bay for the past week and a half. Here at Sybil’s peaceful, secluded retreat, he could almost forget he was a hunted man. Now the reality of his situation slapped him like an icy wind off the north Pacific.

She placed her cool palm on his cheek and gently turned his face until his green eyes met her violet ones. “You must learn to trust your intuition. It will guide you through the challenges ahead. I want you to start paying attention to hunches, serendipitous happenings, things you know but can’t explain.”

Like the vision of the men in the white car. Suddenly he was very tired. He lay down on the soft grass and put his head in Sybil’s lap. Being with her always made him feel safe, perhaps because she’d helped bring him into the world.

Sybil stroked his hair tenderly, as if he were still a child. Her long fingers brushed his cheek, his forehead, then across his lips and chin, down his neck. Eli surrendered to her touch. The sensation was both soothing and erotic. Heat flickered in his groin. Does she know I’m getting aroused? he wondered. Probably.

He nuzzled deeper into Sybil’s lap and inhaled her scent. Miranda had perceived the situation accurately. Sybil was a MILF. And for as long as he could remember, he’d desired her. She probably knows that, too.

Sybil bent and kissed his cheek. “Dear Eli, why don’t you rest for a while? I’m going to start dinner.”

Rising as gracefully as smoke, she walked back through the woods to the house, leaving him to sleep beside the pond.

He hadn’t heard Sybil return, but when he reached out he found her lying beside him on the damp grass. His hand touched her bare thigh, cool and silky, and slid up to her hip. She sighed and rolled onto her back. In the moonlight, her luminous body seemed flawless — slimmer and firmer than the bodies of most women half her age. Eli stroked her stomach, his fingertips grazing the triangle of silver hair at its base. Again she sighed and opened her legs, inviting him to explore deeper.

As he leaned down to kiss what she offered him, he noticed he was naked. Did she undress me? he wondered.

“Eli,” she moaned softly, raising her hips to meet his mouth. “Eli.”

He could feel his blood pulsing in his cock, as if his heart were beating there.

“Eli.” Her voice was louder now, more insistent. “Eli, dinner’s ready.”

Confused, he opened his eyes. The sun hung low in the sky, slipping rapidly toward the horizon. Sybil stood over him, wearing a long blue dress. He glanced down at his body and saw that he, too, was fully clothed. His erection strained against his jeans.

“Sorry to wake you, but it’s time for dinner,” she said.

He sat up quickly, trying to hide his hard-on. A squirrel scurried along a branch overhead, chattering raucously. Eli felt certain it was laughing at him. As the last vestiges of his dream receded into the gathering dusk, he pushed himself up and followed Sybil to the house.

Erotic thoughts still lingered in Eli’s mind as he took his chair at the table on the screened-in porch. A bottle of Meditrina’s Merlot sat open, breathing; a vase of fresh flowers from Sybil’s garden perfumed the air. Candles waited to be lit. This looks like a setting for lovers. Is she teasing me?

Sybil placed a quiche, made with eggs laid by her Rhode Island Reds, on the table beside a large wooden bowl of salad greens, fresh strawberries, and goat cheese. The aroma of hot garlic bread made his mouth water.

“Thank you, Sybil,” he said as she lit the candles. “For everything.”

“I enjoy your company,” she answered simply. “I cherish my solitude, but sometimes it can get lonely here. Besides, you’ve been a great help with the garden and you’ve fixed so much around the property. The place hasn’t looked this good in years.”

Eli filled their glasses and a wave of sadness washed over him. He missed working in the vineyard. He missed his friends and colleagues, and his old life. As he sipped the Merlot, he thought, Will Meditrina ever make wine this good again? So many of the old grapevines had been torn out and burned to keep the deadly fungus from spreading, and it would be years before the new vines produced quality grapes.

Meditrina’s success, it seemed, had led to its downfall. Ten years ago, when he first stared working there, the small family-owned operation garnered the respect of savvy locals and a handful of aficionados, but few people outside the Valley recognized its name. Then their wines won several major awards, and the world started paying attention. Especially the competition.

“I still can’t figure out how they discovered I was onto them,” he wondered aloud.

“The answer will come to you,” Sybil assured him. “Pay attention to your dreams. They often provide insights that can be useful when you’re awake.”

What would she think if she knew about my dream this afternoon? he mused. He finished his slice of quiche and reached for a second helping. “Somehow I’ve got to stop these guys before they ruin other California vineyards, too.”

“In order to do that, you’ll have to be careful and clever, not just brave. You’ll need to use all your senses—the sixth, as well as the usual five.”

“Can you see how all this will turn out?”

Sybil shook her head. “The future isn’t fixed. Everything you do and think influences what happens.”

“So what should I do?”

“First of all, don’t let fear and anger dominate your mind. Often, we attract what we dwell on.”

She smiled at him across the table. In the candlelight she seemed more beautiful than ever. He reached for her hand, wishing he could turn back time.

“Remember what I said about your dreams,” she said. “Write them down. If you like, we can discuss them and decipher the symbols they contain.”

She stood beside his bed, her long silver hair partially concealing her nakedness.

Eli turned back the covers and invited her in. As she nestled beside him, his cock jumped to attention. He brushed her hair away from her face and kissed her gently, then more urgently. Her nipples stiffened against his chest. Taking first one, then the other in his mouth, he sighed, I’ve been waiting for this moment all my life.

Sybil’s soft hand grasped his cock and began stroking it. “I want you, Eli.”

“I’ve always loved you,” he said, sliding his fingers through her silky pubic hair into her warm, wet pussy.

“I want you inside me, now.” She opened her legs wider and guided his aching cock toward her.

Eli pushed himself up on his elbows and moved between her smooth thighs. As he gazed down at her, inexplicably her face and body morphed. Miranda’s lips begged him to enter her. Miranda’s dark hair with the crazy purple streaks spilled across his pillow.

Miranda’s full, firm breasts pointed their rosy tips at him.

What’s going on? he wondered. In his ear, Miranda moaned, “Palace.” He plunged into her depths and felt his juice spurt.

He awoke drenched in sweat and semen. This hasn’t happened in ages. He got up and still half-asleep, stumbled to the bathroom. While he cleaned himself up, he contemplated his dream and grinned at the idea of discussing it with Sybil. No fucking way.

Then he recalled the word Miranda had uttered: “Palace.” Not something a woman usually said in the throes of passion. Did it mean something, and if so, what?

Eli couldn’t get a cell phone signal at Sybil’s house and he didn’t want to use her land line to check in with Meditrina—their caller ID would capture her number. Right now he thought it best that no one, not even his colleagues at the vineyard, knew where he was. So every few days he borrowed Sybil’s pickup and drove into town to phone Troy Aransas, Meditrina’s CEO.

Troy answered on the second ring. After exchanging pleasantries, he said, “I’ve been reading the report your professor friend sent. The link between the French fungus and the one that killed our vines seems pretty clear.”

“Are you going to press charges?”

“Hold on, Eli. All we know is the two fungi are the same. There’s no evidence anyone intentionally infected our vines.”

“Then how’d it get there? The only two places it exists are France and Meditrina’s vineyards. It wasn’t brought by FedEx.”

“I don’t know yet. We’re still trying to figure that out.”

Frustrated, Eli asked, “So why did those two French guys attack me? You think it’s a coincidence?”

“I don’t know that either. It could be just that: a coincidence.”

Eli drummed his fingers on the truck’s steering wheel. “Troy, you believe me, don’t you?”

“Believing and proving are two entirely different things. We can’t go accusing our competitors unless we have a solid case.” Troy sighed loudly. “This report adds useful information that can help us solve the mystery. I’m grateful to you for collecting all this data.”

“And risking my neck in the process,” Eli reminded him.

“That too. By the way, you had a visitor a few days ago.”

“A Frenchman?” Eli asked, his voice laced with sarcasm.

“Nope, American. A distributor you met at a wine tasting at The Palace. He left his card.”

The Palace. He’d attended a wine tasting at the elegant San Francisco hotel the evening before he’d been assaulted. Closing his eyes, Eli tried to recall the details. He remembered mentioning his discovery to a friend who worked at a vineyard in the Sonoma Valley. Perhaps someone had overheard? Someone who had a very good reason for squelching that discovery? That’s what Miranda was trying to tell me in the dream.

“Thanks, Troy. I’ll check back with you in a couple of days.”

“Okay. Watch your ass, now.”

“Absolutely. I’m quite fond of my ass.”

Next, he tried Miranda and got her voice mail. “Sorry I missed your call…”

He waited for the beep, then said in a tone that he hoped sounded sexy, “I had an erotic dream about you last night. Call me back and I’ll tell you all about it.”

Pocketing his cell phone, Eli got out of the truck and strolled down the sidewalk in search of a good cup of coffee. The morning fog was burning off and the day promised to be sunny and sweet. After walking a few blocks, he smelled the enticing aroma of java accompanied by the seductive scent of fresh-baked bread. His stomach growled.

Pavarotti’s aria from Carmen greeted him as he entered the little Italian bakery.

Eagerly he examined a glass case full of pastries: cookies, sticky buns, cannoli, and cupcakes in rainbow colors. Another case held more than a dozen cakes, plus an equal number of pies. Coffee steamed behind the counter.

Several moments passed, but no one appeared to take his order.

“Hello,” he called. When nobody responded he called again, “Hello?”

Intoxicated by the heady smells, Eli decided to help himself to a cup of coffee and a sticky bun and just leave some money beside the cash register. As he opened the glass door of the pastry case, he heard a woman’s voice cry out, “Mio caro, ” from behind a checkered curtain that covered a doorway into a back room. A man’s voice answered passionately, “Bella, Bella, Bella.”

Eli stepped closer to the curtain and listened. He heard grunts, moans, and the unmistakable sound of flesh slapping against flesh. Quietly, he pulled the curtain aside and peeked in. Inside the dimly lit storeroom, a Rubenesque woman with a tumble of thick black hair straddled a man sitting on a folding chair, his pants bunched around his ankles. Beneath her ruffled red skirt, the man’s hands squeezed the cheeks of her ample ass as she rose and sank, rose and sank, again and again, as leisurely as a boat bobbing on the ocean.

His own cock stiffening, Eli watched as the woman shifted her position 180 degrees so her ass now pressed against her partner’s belly. Her white blouse hung open, her bra dangled loose. Her enormous breasts heaved and swayed, glistening with sweat.

The man’s hands reached around her body and toyed with her huge, brown nipples. She sighed again. “Ah, mio caro.”

Slipping his hand into his pocket, Eli stroked his cock with his fingertips. But his jeans were too tight to permit a good grip.

The woman opened her eyes and spotted him. He started to drop the curtain, but she grinned and licked her full lips with exaggerated slowness. Her dark eyes laughed as she appraised his bulge. Eli smiled back.

As her partner pumped harder and faster, the woman threw back her head and let out a cry that began low and deep, then rapidly swept up an octave and hung there quivering, as if she were singing along with Pavarotti. The man groaned in accompaniment.

Not wanting the man to catch him spying on them, Eli withdrew into the main part of the bakery and waited until the couple emerged, flushed and disheveled. The man glanced at him, then hurried out. The woman adjusted her skirt, smiled broadly, and stepped behind the counter. In the bright light, he could see she was probably about his age, mid-thirties at most.

“What would you like?” she asked Eli. As she spoke, her hands dipped and soared like birds in flight.

A blow job, he wanted to say, but instead he pointed to a tray of buns drizzled with honey and sprinkled with nuts. “One of those and a cup of black coffee.”

“Come with me. I have something better.”

She motioned for him to follow her through a door that led into a cluttered kitchen. Pots, pans, and assorted cooking implements were everywhere. A large worktable, dusty with flour, stood in the center of the room. Along one wall ran shelves stacked with baked goods. The woman chose one and handed it to him.

Eli stared at the plump, creamy globe with the salmon-pink frosting tip in the center. Is this what I think it is, he wondered, or do I still have sex on my mind?

Seeing his confusion, the woman laughed and pointed at the shelves. He moved closer to get a better look. On one shelf he saw pastries—like the one she’d given him—

resembling breasts in various sizes. Another shelf held loaves of white, rye, and pumpernickel bread shaped like penises. Buns formed like pussies rested on another tray, their slits shiny with a sugar-and-egg white glaze.

“Eat,” the woman told him, indicating the breast-shaped puff pastry she’d given him.

He grinned, then bit into the sweet, warm dough. “Mmmm. It’s delicious.”

She nodded, accepting the compliment. He took another bite. As he chewed, he felt a twinge of desire in his groin. By the time he’d finished eating, he was fully erect.

What the hell…?

The woman winked as she unzipped his jeans and slid them down over his narrow hips. While he licked his fingers, she circled his shaft with her hand and massaged him, rubbing and pulling and squeezing as if she were kneading dough.

“I couldn’t let you go away hungry,” she said.

Kneeling before him, she cupped his balls with her other hand and slid her hot, wet mouth over his swollen cock. She licked and sucked with such relish that Eli quickly spurted into her throat. She swallowed, then flicked her tongue over her lips as if she’d just tasted a most delectable treat.

As he fastened his jeans, she pinched his cheek fondly and said, “Now we’ll have coffee.”

“Why did you become a baker?” Eli asked.

“I like making people happy,” Bella answered. “When you were a little boy, did your mother bake cookies and birthday cakes for you?”

Eli nodded.

“Even now, you associate those sweets with love. Am I right?”

He nodded again.

“There’s too much fear and anger in the world, and not enough love,” Bella said, her dancing hands punctuating her words. “In my own way, I’m trying to change that. ‘Make love, not war,’ yes?”

“You certainly turned my day around,” he said, grinning.

They were sitting at a café table in front of the bakery, drinking espresso and eating desserts. Not the erotic ones, though. “In those,” she confessed, “I put a secret ingredient.”

“Viagra?” he asked, remembering how he’d inexplicably gotten hard when he bit into the pastry breast.

“No, silly.”

“What, then?”

Bella smiled slyly. “If I told you, it wouldn’t be a secret.”

“How about a hint?”

“Let’s just call it the elixir of love.”

She passed him a brownie, peppered with walnuts and chocolate chips.

“Is there a secret ingredient in this?” he asked. “Marijuana, maybe?”

“Of course not.” She shook her head so hard a lock of her thick, dark hair slipped free of its tortoiseshell comb. “I’m no druggie. Unless love is the drug.”

“I’m going to get fat if I keep eating all these wonderful things.”

She patted her round belly. “Well, maybe I’m too fat. But who would trust a skinny baker?”

A blond woman with two little girls in tow approached the bakery.

“Scusi,” Bella said and went inside to serve them.

While Eli munched his brownie he contemplated his situation. Sunshine spilled across his shoulders. A light breeze ruffled his amber hair. Funny, he could barely recall the anxiety he’d experienced earlier today. He’d gobbled lots of gourmet goodies, gotten his dick sucked. At the moment, life was good.

The blonde with the children came out, carrying a big bag and a cardboard box tied with string. When she caught him looking at her, she blushed and hurried away. Does that box contain confectionary pricks and pussies? he wondered.

Bella returned with more coffee and a plate of blueberry muffins. She settled her voluminous backside on the dainty café chair and buttered a muffin.

“Why did you become a winemaker?” she asked.

“I guess I’m like you. I want to create good things that will give people pleasure.”

“Yes, it’s important to use our abilities to create something—wine, baked goods, music, poetry, whatever.” Bella licked crumbs from her fingers and pointed to an elderly man across the street, meticulously pruning his rose bushes. “See that old gentleman? His labor creates beauty for all to enjoy, and look how it pleases him. Everyone is happy.”

She waved at the old man and he waved back. “Tonight I will take him some éclairs, and he will give me some roses. In this way we exchange love.”

A middle-aged couple entered the bakery and once again Bella excused herself. A few minutes later they emerged, arm in arm, each holding a shopping bag full of baked goods.

Bella threw them a kiss as they got into their car. “They are having a party,” she told Eli.

“It’ll probably turn into an orgy.”

“I hope so.” She handed him a paper bag.

“What’s this?”

“Some bread to take home for dinner. Regular bread, not the sexy kind.”

“Thanks,” Eli said, taking it from her. “Did you sell all of the ‘sexy kind’ already?”

“Most of it. The rest is promised.”

He watched the couple who’d bought two shopping bags full of Bella’s specialties drive away. “The man you were with earlier…”

“Ah yes. Poor man.” Bella shook her head sadly. “He is much in need of love.

Once he wished to be an artist, but his father convinced him it was not a manly thing to do. So now he is a soldier. And very angry. When we are not allowed to create, love turns to hate and we become destroyers.”

A red convertible pulled up and a tall, handsome man in an expensive suit got out.

“Buon giorno,” he said to Bella.

“Carissimo,” she replied. The looks that passed between them were hot enough to melt steel.

Eli stood up. Time to go. “Thank you again, Bella. For everything.”

“My pleasure,” she said, smiling broadly. “Come back another time, and bring me some of your wine.”

“I will.”

Feeling thoroughly sated, Eli walked back to where he’d parked Sybil’s truck. He snapped open his cell phone, surprised to find it was well past noon. He still had to go to the supermarket, the hardware store, and the bank. He tried Miranda again and this time she answered her phone.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“Montana.”

“What are you doing there?”

She laughed. “Believe it or not, I’m working in a furniture factory.”

“Whatever for?”

“It’s a long story. I’ll explain later. First I want to hear about your dream.”

Miranda was so intent on texting Eli about Montana’s peculiarities that she neglected to look around her before she stepped off the sidewalk. She heard tires squeal, then the crunch of metal against metal. She jumped away and screamed. Broken glass tinkled around her.

The man whose car had smacked into the traffic light pole climbed out of his crumpled vehicle, slammed the door, and stamped over to Miranda. His crew cut and erect posture reminded her of a drill sergeant.

“Look what you have done!” he shouted, pointing at his damaged Volvo.

“You’re the one who wrecked your car, not me,” she countered.

“If I had not swerved when you walked into the street, you would be a dead woman now.” He spoke with a clipped, almost formal accent that sounded vaguely German, or maybe Scandinavian.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” Miranda apologized. “I should have looked. It was an accident.”

“Are you always so careless with your life?”

She shrugged. “I said I was sorry. What do you want me to do?”

“You must compensate me for the damage to my car.”

“Don’t you have insurance?”

The man rolled his eyes. “Of course, but that is not the issue. Although I must pay the deductible. The important thing is you must realize that your actions affect others.”

Miranda was growing annoyed. True, she hadn’t been paying attention. True, she might have been injured if the man hadn’t swerved to avoid her. True, the guy had reason to be upset about his car. But her negligence was an error in judgment, not a character flaw. This man was turning a mishap into a morality lesson.

By now, a small crowd had gathered to gawk. Trying to remain calm, Miranda pulled out her checkbook. “I’m willing to accept part of the blame for what happened.

Why don’t I split the deductible with you?”

“I do not want your money.”

“You said you wanted me to compensate you for the damages. I’m offering to pay half.”

“That is too easy. You learn nothing from the experience.”

Miranda’s patience was wearing thin. “Look, I’m trying to be reasonable. I don’t have to give you a penny. I can walk away right now and you can’t hang a thing on me.”

“You are wrong, my young friend. You owe me a great debt, perhaps even your life.”

Is he threatening me? Miranda wondered. “But you refused my money. What do you want?”

The man answered, “You will work for me for one week. In that time, I will endeavor to teach you about behaving responsibly toward others. Do you agree?”

Miranda started to object—the man’s arrogance was maddening—but suddenly something Eli’s friend Sybil had said popped into her head: “There are no coincidences.

Problems are opportunities in disguise.” Could this smug, self-righteous man really teach her something?

“What kind of business are you in?” Miranda asked. I’m not going to pluck chickens or clean motel rooms.

“I make furniture.”

“Okay,” she agreed, to shut him up. If it turned out to be terrible, she could always quit.

The man held out his hand and Miranda shook it. “Okay.” He pulled a business card out of his wallet. “Here is the address. Tomorrow at nine, you will start work. And now, let me see if this poor car of mine can still be driven.”

The next morning when Miranda arrived at the spacious, orderly furniture shop with its brick walls and metal roof, she was surprised to see a diverse group of perhaps two dozen people working there: old men and teenagers, blacks and whites, a few women, even a blind man and one who appeared to have Down Syndrome. Henry Kolb, her “employer,” greeted her with a curt nod and led her to the mill area, where he showed her how to guide boards as they came off the planer.

It was tedious work and soon her mind began to wander. She scoped out the place for attractive guys. Only one, who had the brawny blond wholesomeness of a farm boy, intrigued her, except he didn’t look old enough to buy cigarettes. Everybody in the shop seemed interested in her, however. They probably don’t see many women with purple-streaked hair in this little Montana town, she figured. Her female co-workers were strong, plain, stocky types who did nothing to emphasize their feminine attributes. No need to bother with makeup tomorrow, she decided, especially since the goggles and dust mask Henry had given her hid most of her face.

All morning long, Miranda caught boards and stacked them in bins, with the help of a burly black man named Able. Conversation was impossible over the roar of the planer. By lunchtime she was exhausted. Sawdust covered her hair and clothing. Her ears rang despite the protective headphones she’d been given to block the noise.

She went out to the loading dock, sat down, and unwrapped the sandwich she’d bought on the way to work. Soon the other workers gathered around her like bees on clover, introducing themselves and asking her questions.

“What’s your name?”

“Where are you from?”

Before she finished answering one person, someone else fired another query at her.

“Why did you come here?”

“Do you like working here?”

She shook more than a dozen hands, remembering only a few names. The cute guy told her his name was Josh, that he’d graduated from high school last month, and his father worked in the shop, too. A butch woman with close-cropped hair handed Miranda a Coke. The blind man asked to touch her face. When she explained she would only be working there one week, they seemed disappointed.

After lunch Henry assigned her a new task: oiling furniture. “Josh will show you what to do,” he said.

At least it’s quieter than the planer, she thought. And I get to ogle Josh.

“We rotate jobs a lot,” Josh told her. “That way it’s not boring and everyone gets to take part in the whole process, from beginning to end.”

He dribbled linseed oil on a cherry table and began rubbing it into the pinkish wood with slow, circular motions. As he leaned over the table, his T-shirt stretched taut across his muscular back and his jeans hugged his butt. His biceps bulged. Miranda imagined him rubbing oil into her skin and felt her pussy tingle. When he knelt and began oiling the table’s legs, she envisioned those strong hands stroking her legs. Mentally she stripped him naked, fantasizing about his washboard abs, his tight buns, his hard cock.

“Think you can do it?” he asked.

She smiled at him. “Maybe you’d better guide me.”

Josh handed her a rag, then placed his hand over hers and moved it around and around, until the wood had absorbed the oil. Miranda leaned against him, enjoying his heat and the strength of his body. The tingling in her pussy ratcheted up a notch and she felt herself getting wet. This job might not be so bad after all.

He stepped away and cleared his throat. “Okay, why don’t you try it yourself?”

When Miranda’s eyes met his, he turned bright red. She glanced at his crotch.

Definitely some action going on there.

For the next couple of hours, Miranda oiled chairs, chests, and tables while her imagination transformed them into Josh’s body. Several times he caught her watching him and blushed. When they took their afternoon break, she expected him to join her, but he bolted for the men’s room. Maybe he’s going to jerk off, she mused, wishing he’d asked her to come along.

Instead, it was Henry who sought her out. He took her on a tour of the facility, pointing out the various departments and explaining the business with obvious pride. She had to admit, the furniture they crafted was beautiful.

Miranda asked about her coworkers. “Why are those old men working here? Shouldn’t they be retired?”

“They have always worked here, since before I was born,” Henry replied.

“Without their labor, this business would not exist today.”

“What about the retarded guy? And the blind man?”

The questions seemed to puzzle him. “What about them?”

“It can’t be cost effective keeping them on when you could hire more capable people to do their jobs.”

“And how cost effective, as you say, would it be if I put them out of their jobs?

Then they would earn no money, pay no taxes, and have to be supported by the state,” he explained, as if he were speaking to a child. “They do not want handouts. They want to have a chance to earn their own way. Besides, the blind man has eyes in his fingertips—he canes chairs faster than the sighted workers.”

Henry tapped the top of a bureau Miranda had oiled. “And the one whose brain is not so quick as yours, he does not let his mind wander while he works. He would not miss these spots, as you have.”

Chagrined, Miranda wondered if he knew she’d been daydreaming about Josh instead of concentrating on her job. Henry turned and started to walk away, then called back over his shoulder, “Also, I am a practical man.”

Miranda wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but he didn’t elaborate and left her to wonder. Is Henry a truly enlightened employer, a socialist, or a shrewd businessman who hires handicapped people because he can get away with paying them less?

The next day Miranda asked Henry, “What did you mean yesterday when you said you were a practical man?”

“I did not want you to think I run this shop on compassion,” Henry answered. “I am a businessman, not what you call a ‘do-gooder.’ I am smart enough to realize that people who do not have jobs cannot afford my furniture. Employers who think they are clever when they relocate their companies to places where labor is cheap…soon nobody will have the money to buy their products.” He shook his head. “Now I must go back to my work, and so should you. Josh over there looks like he could use some help.”

Today Josh was working at a table saw. Miranda grabbed the end of the board he was slicing and steadied it.

“Henry’s kinda strange, don’t you think?” she asked after Josh had finished the cut and shut off the saw.

“He’s odd, all right—a businessman with a conscience and common sense. Not many of them around these days.”

Before she could conjure up a good fantasy about Josh, her cell phone buzzed. Its vibrate function was so strong it could double as a sex toy. She flipped it open and saw Eli’s name on the screen. Excusing herself, she hurried to the restroom—Henry didn’t allow them to use their cell phones during work—and locked herself in one of the stalls.

“I want to hear about your dream,” she said.

“You’re lying on your back on my bed and I’m kneeling between your open legs,” Eli began. “In the moonlight your body is so beautiful, all creamy and soft. I bury my face between your breasts, then circle your nipples with my tongue, very slowly. My cock keeps getting bigger and harder, and I rub your nipples with its tip…”

Miranda interrupted, “Wait a sec while I get out of these jeans.” She pulled them down and sat on the toilet. Holding the phone with one hand she slid the other between her legs. “Okay, continue.”

Eli chuckled. “I glide my cock down your stomach, leaving a wet line all the way from your heart to your pretty black triangle. You moan softly.”

“Aaahh,” Miranda sighed, toying with her pussy.

“I tease your clit with the head of my big, hard cock. Can you feel me rubbing against you?”

Miranda flicked her swollen knob and pretended her thumb was his cock. “Yes, yes.”

“I don’t want you to come yet, so I run my cock down the inside of your left thigh then back up the right one. I feel like I’m on fire, like my cock’s a torch, so hot I’m afraid I might burn you. But you wrap your legs around my hips and pull me toward you.”

“I want you, Eli.”

“Now I’m stroking your seam with my cock, up and down, from your clit to your asshole and back again, over your clit, along your slit…I’m slick with your hot juice and my cock’s pounding so hard it feels like it’s going to explode.”

“Come inside me. I want you to fuck me now,” Miranda cried as she pumped two fingers inside her.

His voice grew deeper, his breathing more ragged. “My cock’s ramming into you now… all the way to the hilt… I’m fucking you hard and fast… deeper and deeper with each thrust. Your cunt’s gripping me… squeezing my cock… my jizzum shoots out… like a fire hose gushing.”

Miranda felt her cunt contract around her fingers as her orgasm rushed through her. “Oh my God, Eli, I’m coming…”

She heard him groan, “Aaawww, me too.”

Gradually the intensity eased, and Miranda giggled at the absurdity of talking dirty on her cell phone to a guy who might one day be her husband while she fingered herself in the ladies’ room of a furniture factory in Montana.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” she said.

Miranda hadn’t thought she’d finish the week, but she did. When she said goodbye to her coworkers at the furniture factory she actually felt a little sad. They’d accepted her without reservation into their oddball family, and in a very short time they’d taught her to value each of them. The mentally disabled kid who always had a smile for everyone. The patient old man who never lost his temper. Indefatigable Able, who willingly helped anyone who fell behind. And Henry, whose employees respected him because he treated them with respect.

“I’m glad I had the opportunity to meet you all,” she said, sincerely.

She’d never managed to do Josh—it turned out he had a steady girlfriend and wasn’t the cheating kind—which was okay with Miranda. He was definitely cute, but not as cute as Eli.

When Miranda opened her eyes, dawn was leaking through the curtains of her room in the little B&B near Durango, Colorado. She pulled the covers over her head and tried to go back to sleep, but her bladder wouldn’t let her. Reluctantly, she pushed herself up and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Her stomach lurched. Her head roared like a blender whipping up a batch of daiquiris.

Way too many daiquiris, she lamented as she stumbled into the bathroom. She peed, then splashed cold water on her face. What a night. She glanced at herself in the mirror, decided, I look like hell, and searched through her toiletry case for some Alka Seltzer.

That cute Jamaican guy with the dreadlocks had sure done some amazing things with rum. And with his tongue. Miranda smiled, remembering how he’d brought a tray of frozen strawberry-and-banana cocktails to her table beside the swimming pool. She was sitting with three women who’d invited her to come with them to a party given by a software tycoon at his mountainside mansion.

The Jamaican’s flowered swimming trunks hung low on his hips, revealing six-pack abs and a hint of curly dark hair peeking above the waistband. His sleek skin shone like polished mahogany. He caught Miranda sizing him up and grinned, his teeth sparkling like stars. As he leaned forward to set her glass on the table, his hand brushed her shoulder and he spilled some of the icy drink on her arm.

“Sorry, ma’am,” he said. “Let me clean it up.”

He knelt beside her and slowly licked her arm with his long, soft tongue. Every nerve ending in Miranda’s body tingled. When he’d finished, he stood up and lewdly ran his tongue over his lips before sauntering off to serve another table.

Giggling, Miranda held her cold drink to her flushed cheek, trying to cool off.

“Oh my God.”

“Down, girl!” one of her companions hooted and fanned Miranda with a napkin.

They clinked their glasses together as the band launched into a reggae tune.

During the course of the evening, they clinked glasses again and again as the Jamaican brought a variety of fruit concoctions laced with golden rum to their table. Miranda lost count of how many she consumed. She remembered dancing the salsa, the rhumba, and the cha-cha. Then someone swept her into a conga line that wound between the tables and around the pool. From time to time, she noticed the Jamaican guy watching her.

When she broke away to go to the bathroom, he was waiting beside the door. He pulled her in, locked the door, and lifted her onto the vanity. Almost before she realized what was happening, he’d removed her swimsuit top and begun making lazy circles around her breasts with his silky tongue as if he were eating an ice cream cone.

Gradually, the circles grew smaller, the tip of his tongue twirling her nipples until she felt herself melting.

He ran his tongue down to her belly, toying with her navel as he slid off the bottom half of her swimsuit. Spreading her legs, he continued his descent. His dreadlocks tickled her thighs as his hot, wet tongue slithered into her seam. The tip of his nose nuzzled her clit as his tongue lapped up her juices. Next he explored her ass. Then he started making delicious, maddening circles around her clit with his tongue, flicking it lightly, and sucking it until she was ready to scream. By the time he thrust his throbbing cock into her, Miranda was delirious with pleasure.

Now, she downed her Alka Seltzer and crawled back into bed. But she couldn’t sleep. Finally she got up again, pulled the curtains aside, and gazed out over a park ringed with trees. A thin mist hovered near the grass. In the faint, yellow-gray light, she could see the ground moving. It rolled and swayed, rising and falling in undulating waves.

Miranda’s first thought was I’m still drunk, followed by Oh my God, it’s an earthquake!

As she grabbed her clothes, the movement took shape. From the shadowy mist human figures emerged—dozens of them—all bending, twisting, turning, and gliding together in a synchronized manner, like dancers performing a strange sort of ballet. Most of them wore baggy white trousers and tunics, as did the slender, bald man who appeared to be leading them. It took her a few moments to realize they were doing tai chi.

Miranda stared at them, transfixed. Men and women, young and old, Asian and Caucasian, moved in harmony with effortless grace. Once or twice she could’ve sworn the leader looked up at her, but how could he know she was watching? When the group finished, parting like the mist dissipating beneath the sun’s rays, she felt an inexplicable sense of peace. Maybe I should try that, she thought as she headed into the bathroom for a long, hot shower.

By lunchtime, Miranda felt almost normal again. She spotted a Korean restaurant and decided to try it. A string of red, yellow, blue, and green cloth squares hung over the entrance, gently fluttering in the breeze. Inside, she was greeted by exquisite paintings of Asian landscapes on the walls and delicate statues carved from ivory, wood, and jade displayed in ornate cases.

She took a seat and scanned the menu a Eurasian teenage girl brought her. My stomach’s probably not ready yet for anything spicy, she decided. When the girl came back with a pot of tea, Miranda ordered seaweed soup and a noodle-and-vegetable dish called chapahae.

“What are those squares of cloth above the front door?” she asked the girl.

“Prayer flags.” Seeing Miranda’s look of confusion, the girl continued. “A Buddhist tradition. We write prayers and blessings on the cloth, so that when the wind blows it will carry the prayers around the world.”

“What a lovely tradition,” Miranda said. “And the artwork here, it’s beautiful.”

“It’s my father’s work.”

“Your father is very talented.”

“Yes, I think so, too.”

Several minutes later, the girl set Miranda’s lunch on the table and handed her a business card. “My father’s gallery, if you wish to stop by.”

“Thank you. I think I will.”

The Golden Gallery, she noticed, was only a few blocks away. So far she hadn’t devoted much time on this trip to artistic pursuits. Only a little sketching here and there, some photographs, a couple visits to museums. I’ve been more concerned with indulging my body than my mind. Miranda tucked the business card in her purse and dug into the chapahae.

I’ve been here before, Miranda thought as she entered the gallery with its yellow walls and polished wooden floor. But that’s impossible. This is my first trip to Colorado.

Yet as she gazed at the paintings and sculptures, she couldn’t shake the feeling of déja vu.

Even the incense, burning in a bowl beside a Buddha statue, smelled familiar.

“Good afternoon,” a bald, middle-aged man with pale amber skin and gently sloping eyes greeted her.

He wore a mustard-colored silk shirt with a persimmon ascot, dark brown trousers and loafers. But Miranda saw him barefoot, dressed in the saffron robes of a Buddhist monk. He smiled and his face suddenly seemed much younger, his features more distinctively Asian. My eyes are still playing tricks on me. I’d better stick to wine in the future—no more rum!

Even more peculiar was her immediate and intense attraction to this stranger. Her heart seemed to leap from her chest and dash toward him, as if he were a long-lost lover for whom she’d been desperately seeking. What the hell is going on? she wondered, struggling to regain her composure.

“Your daughter gave me your card,” she managed to say.

He nodded. “I am Lee Golden. Welcome to my gallery.”

“Golden doesn’t sound like a Korean name.”

“My mother is Korean, my father American.”

“Is all this your artwork?”

“Yes.”

“I’m very impressed.”

“You honor me. Are you an artist?”

Miranda answered, “Yes. Most of my work is abstract.”

She turned her eyes away from him, trying to rein in her feelings, and studied a painting of a beautiful woman pouring water from a vase onto the ground. “Is this a Korean goddess?”

“That is Kwanseieun, one of the most beloved deities in many Asian cultures. In China she is called Kuan Yin.”

“I’ve heard of her,” Miranda said. But where ? How do I know that name?

“This is Dae-Soon, the Korean moon goddess.” Lee indicated a picture of a female figure silhouetted against a silvery moon. “And Yondung Halmoni,” he pointed to another painting, “is the goddess of the wind.”

As Miranda examined the paintings and sculptures, Lee explained the mythology behind them. Oddly, the deities seemed as familiar to her as the Catholic saints she’d been raised with. Yet I know absolutely nothing about Korean spirituality.

His fingers brushed her elbow, sending sparks shooting up her arm, across her shoulder, and into her chest. Butterflies danced in her stomach. As he guided her into another section of the gallery, she saw a tall, stone statue of a man wearing a hat shaped like a Hershey’s Kiss. He looks like a giant penis, Miranda mused.

As if reading her mind, Lee said, “This is a Tol-Harubang statue. They are considered powerful sources of fertility.”

When she touched the statue, it burned her fingertips and she drew back quickly.

“It’s hot.”

“Is it?”

Suddenly, she felt dizzy. Her vision blurred. The walls of the gallery fell away.

Casting her eyes down, Miranda saw a long silk skirt where her jeans should have been.

Even before Miranda called and asked him to meet her in Santa Fe, Eli had decided it was time to leave Sybil’s home. He felt ineffectual, even a bit cowardly, hiding out like this.

“I need to find out who poisoned Meditrina’s grapevines, who attacked me, and whether the two are connected,” he told Sybil as he stuffed some clothing and a few necessities into a backpack. “Maybe it really was a coincidence, as Troy suggested.”

Maybe the Frenchmen in the white car have lost interest and stopped looking for me.

“I understand your need to act and to discover the truth,” Sybil replied. “But please, be careful.”

“Yeah, Troy told me to watch my ass, too.”

She handed him a deerskin pouch about the size of a cigarette lighter, hung on a leather cord. Strange symbols drawn in beadwork decorated the pouch. “This is for protection.”

“Wouldn’t a .45 be more useful?” Eli teased. He fingered the pouch, trying to distinguish the objects secreted inside. “What’s in it?”

“Magic,” she smiled. “It’s your personal amulet. Wear it at all times. And don’t open it.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Eli slipped the cord around his neck, wondering how a beaded leather bag could possibly protect him from assailants bent on destroying him. But Sybil knew things he didn’t, and right now he needed all the good luck he could get.

He zipped the backpack and slung it over one shoulder. “Ready to go?”

“Are you sure you want to ride in a bus all the way to Santa Fe?” she asked as they drove into town.

“It just seems safer,” he explained. “Maybe I’m being paranoid, but renting a car or flying would leave a trail for someone who wanted to track me.”

“I could rent the car in my name.”

“No, Sybil, I don’t want to drag you into this any deeper. You’ve already done so much for me. Besides, this is cheaper and I’ll have a chance to see parts of the country I’ve never been to before.”

He paid cash for his ticket as the Greyhound roared into the station. When the driver called “All aboard,” Eli hugged Sybil hard.

“Give my best to Miranda,” she said.

“I will, and don’t worry. I promise to stay in touch.”

“I’ll be following your progress in the scrying pond.”

He laughed. “I hope you won’t watch everything I do.”

Miranda got into Santa Fe two days ahead of Eli. The time she’d spent painting with Lee Golden had jump-started her creativity; now she worked her way hungrily through the city’s smorgasbord of art galleries and museums. Strolling down Canyon Road, she saw Native American baskets and handwoven shawls, fine silver jewelry and painted silk scarves, sculpture, furniture, pottery, and pictures of all kinds. She even splurged on a pair of custom-made cowgirl boots decorated with yellow butterflies and red flowers.

The morning Eli was due to arrive, she was sitting at the communal table in Café Pasqual’s eating a chorizo burrito when a blond woman next to her pulled out a deck of cards. As she began shuffling them, Miranda saw the cards were illustrated with colorful pictures.

The woman noticed her and asked, “Shall I tell your fortune?”

“I don’t think I want to know what my future holds. I like surprises,” Miranda answered. “But those cards are beautiful. May I see them?”

The woman handed over the deck and Miranda thumbed through the cards. “Oh my,” she exclaimed when she turned up one called, “The Lovers.” On it, a voluptuous woman with long, dark hair wearing a skimpy bikini stood in a lake with her head thrown back in ecstasy; a muscular man knelt before her, holding her in a passionate embrace.

The woman laughed, took the card from Miranda, and laid it on the table between them. “She looks like you.”

Miranda blushed and a card slipped from the deck. It fell face up, showing eight double-pronged staves soaring through the sky.

“Well, well,” the blond woman said.

“What?”

“I thought you didn’t want to know your future.”

“Not if it’s bad.”

“So far it looks pretty interesting.”

Miranda fanned the cards on the table and studied them. One that depicted a knight riding a horse draped in russet livery caught her eye. She reached for it and placed it beside the other two cards.

“Okay, what do they mean?”

The blonde smiled at Miranda. “I’d say your prince is about to come.”

The double entendre made Miranda blush again, then she dissolved into giggles.

The blonde joined in.

“How did you know?” Miranda asked when they’d both stopped laughing.

The woman tapped The Lovers card. “This one’s pretty obvious. And the Eight of Wands,” she said, indicating the card that had dropped from the deck, “suggests passion, excitement, things happening quickly. The Knight of Wands shows a man traveling. I’d say you’re in for a hot time in the old town tonight.”

Miranda grinned and glanced at her watch. “Sooner than that, I hope. His bus gets here in a half-hour.”

“Have fun,” the blonde said as she scooped up the cards and slid them back into a black velvet pouch.

“I intend to. And thanks for the reading.”

“You’re welcome.” She handed Miranda a business card. “If you ever want to know more, call me.”

They barely made it into the room Miranda had booked in a B&B near the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum. Halfway up the stairway, Eli backed her to wall, rubbing his erection against her, and she almost begged him to take her right there on the landing.

“I really missed you,” he whispered, nuzzling her neck.

“I can tell.”

He kissed her and slid his hand under her shirt, slipping his fingers inside her red lace bra. Miranda sighed into his open mouth. When he lifted her breast out of the underwire cup and bent to suck her nipple, she moaned softly.

Footsteps on the stairs below sent them scurrying into Miranda’s second-floor room. As she flipped the lock, he pulled her shirt over her head and unhooked her bra.

Her breasts sprang free, her hard nipples straining toward him for attention. The crotch of her jeans was already soaked by the time he pulled them down around her ankles.

“Feels like you missed me, too,” he said, running a finger inside her panties.

His fingertip brushed her clit ever so lightly, urging it to swell like a flower in time-lapse photography. Miranda arched toward him and pressed against his fingers, trying to suck them inside her. Eli obliged, inserting two while continuing to flick her clit with his thumb.

“Help me get these boots off,” she said impatiently.

Kneeling before her, he tugged off her new cowgirl boots while she gripped his shoulder for support. Then he pressed his face to her pussy and inhaled her scent.

Miranda threw her head back, crying out as Eli licked along the edge of her panties and gently nibbled her through the silky fabric. We’re like the couple on The Lovers card, she thought, twisting her fingers in his golden hair. When he pulled the silk aside and swiped her seam with his tongue, she exploded in a dazzling array of colors.

Her orgasm swept aside Eli’s tenderness. He yanked off her panties and practically tore away his own clothing. He picked her up, tossed her on the bed, and rolled on a condom. I wish we didn’t have to use those things, she thought, longing for his bare skin. But I’m not ready for a monogamous relationship yet.

Diving onto the bed, he rammed his cock into her so hard, she gasped. Again and again, he plunged. Miranda opened wider, inviting him to plumb her depths. Like flint on steel, each thrust sent sparks flying until flames burst inside her again. She felt his cock pulsing as he came. As if he’d thrown gasoline on her fire, his throbbing ignited a conflagration and she came twice more in rapid succession.

Lying in his arms afterward, she first noticed the deerskin amulet he wore around his neck. “Where did you get this?” she asked, stroking it lightly with her fingertip. “It looks Indian.”

“Sybil gave it to me. It’s supposed to be some kind of protection amulet.”

She pushed herself up on one elbow and stared down at him. “Does Sybil think you’re in need of protection?”

Eli rumpled her hair affectionately. “Sybil worries too much about me. Always has.”

He pulled her down beside him and snuggled against her. A moment later Miranda heard him snore softly.

I’m really starting to care for this guy, she thought. Quickly, she pushed the idea aside, rationalizing, it’s just great sex. Don’t confuse lust with love.

Miranda had waited to visit the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum until she could see it with Eli. Together they viewed the extensive collection of the artist’s paintings, drawings, sculptures, and photographs—nearly one thousand in all.

“I don’t know much about art,” Eli admitted. “Is it my imagination or are those flowers intentionally sexy?”

“It’s not your imagination.”

He pointed to a blatantly vaginal blue-green painting. “That one reminds me of you,” he said, and slid his hand under the short denim skirt he’d insisted she wear without panties.

“Eli! Someone will see us.”

He winked at her, hooking a finger in her slit. “That’s part of the fun.”

“Animal,” she said and laughed, pulling away.

But her pussy tingled and her heart stepped up its beat. As they strolled through the museum, each painting she saw of a virile tree or a lush blossom fueled her desire.

Erotica for art lovers, she mused. Maybe I should try my hand at it. By the time they’d finished their tour, Miranda was ready for another round at the B&B.

They decided to celebrate their last night together in Santa Fe at the legendary

“Pink.” The three-hundred-year-old rose-colored adobe house in the city’s historic Barrio de Analco was now a romantic restaurant, complete with low-beamed ceilings, terrific food, and one of the best bars in the country. Miranda felt torn, knowing that tomorrow they’d go their separate ways again. Although she itched to be on the road—she still had a lot of territory to explore—she was going to miss Eli.

“I plan to check out the Texas wine region,” he told her as he filled her glass with a good Napa Valley Cabernet.

“I didn’t realize Texans made wine,” she said.

“Texas isn’t all cactus and tumbleweeds. The Hill Country looks a lot like Tuscany and the weather’s pretty similar, which is why you’ll find a lot of vineyards there. Most of the wine isn’t very good, though. At least, not yet.”

Miranda dug into her lobster, crab, and shrimp enchiladas. “So why go?”

“A guy I used to work with has a vineyard there. He’s a specialist in grapevine diseases. I want to discuss the fungus that killed Meditrina’s vines with him—he might have some ideas about how it got there and how to deal with the problem.”

Eli took a bite of his steak with mushrooms and green chile and chewed it contemplatively. Watching him, Miranda thought wistfully, in the morning he’ll be gone.

If she hadn’t already promised to visit her uncle in Arkansas, she’d consider going with him. Maybe we can meet in Texas in a week or two.

“What about those French thugs?” she asked. “Do you think they’re still looking for you?”

“I honestly don’t know. I haven’t seen them since we left San Francisco. I’m keeping a low profile, but I’m not going to hide out like a scared rabbit forever.”

She laid her hand over his, wishing she’d asked the card reader for more information. “Be careful.”

“I have to resolve this matter so I can get back to my old life.” His green eyes held hers, willing her to understand.

“I know.”

Reaching into his pocket, Eli withdrew a small box and set it on the table. “I couldn’t resist buying this for you. A Navaho woman who lives on a reservation north of here made it.”

Miranda removed the lid and lifted out a delicate silver bracelet set with turquoise. “It’s beautiful.”

“To help you remember our time here together.”

“I’ll never forget our time here,” she said, slipping the bracelet on her wrist.

“Thank you.”

Their waiter stopped by to see if they needed anything else. As he topped off their wineglasses, Miranda asked Eli, “How will you get to Texas?”

“Take the bus, I guess. There’s one that leaves a little after seven tomorrow morning.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” said the waiter. “What part of Texas are you going to?”

“Fredericksburg,” Eli answered.

“My mom’s driving to Austin tomorrow. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if you rode with her. She likes company.”

“Really? That would certainly make things easier. But what makes you think you can trust your mother with me? You don’t even know me.”

“You don’t know my mom.” The waiter wrote down his mother’s name and phone number and handed them to Eli. “I’ll call and tell her you’ll be on board.”

“Thanks.”

Miranda smiled at him. “Sybil would say there are no coincidences.” So would Lee Golden. She was beginning to believe it herself.

When Miranda and Eli drove into the IHOP parking lot, the red eighteen-wheeler was waiting for them, rumbling and smoking like a dragon. “Ruby the Mother Trucker” was painted on its doors in gold leaf. Miranda pulled up to it and Ruby leaned out the window of the cab. The hue of her curly hair matched the truck exactly.

“Don’t worry, honey. I’ll take good care of him,” Ruby yelled over the noise of the trick’s engine.

Eli laid his hand on Miranda’s thigh. “I’ll call you tonight.”

“Have a safe trip.”

She unhooked her seatbelt and leaned across the console to kiss him. As his lips met hers and his tongue slid into her mouth, she regretted her decision to let him go to Texas without her. It’s only for a couple of weeks, she reminded herself.

“Have fun visiting your uncle,” he said, reaching into the back seat for his pack.

“I will. See you soon.”

Despite his smile, his pale green eyes looked serious. For a moment, he seemed about to say something. Instead, he touched the tip of her nose lightly and got out of the car. Miranda fingered the Navaho silver bracelet on her wrist and watched him climb into the truck, a knot of loneliness tightening in her chest as they roared away in a cloud of diesel fumes.

When the truck rolled onto the highway, Ruby held out her hand to Eli.

“Welcome aboard. I’m Ruby.”

“I figured as much,” he said. “I’m Eli Hart. Thanks for the ride. I really appreciate it.”

Allher clothing, including her high-top sneakers, was ruby-red. A necklace of red stones hung around her neck, sparkling on her ample chest. Red globes the size of eggs dangled from her ears. Every finger on both hands sported a ring with a red gem.

Noticing him eying her jewels, she said, “They’re not real. Truckers don’t make that kind of money unless they’re hauling contraband. The boobs aren’t real either.”

He laughed at her unabashed admission. “Last night when your son first suggested I catch a ride to Texas with his mother, I pictured a matron with an SUV or maybe a Crown Vic.”

“And even when he told you I drove a rig, you didn’t expect the Mother Trucker, right?”

“No way,” he admitted.

Ruby pulled a pack of Camel filters from behind the visor and shook one out, then offered the pack to Eli.

“No, thanks.”

“Driving these long stretches gets lonely,” she said, the cigarette wagging between her crimson lips. “If you weren’t here, I’d most likely pick up a hitchhiker. My kid frowns on that.”

“Your son thought I’d keep you out of trouble?”

“Naw, he’s given up. He just likes to minimize it whenever possible.” She slid a CD into the console player and Stevie Ray Vaughan’s screaming guitar zinged through the cab. “Besides, you seem like you might have some trouble of your own.”

“What makes you think that?” he asked.

“Number one, you’re too old to be hitching around the country on a lark. Number two, people who travel by bus are usually poor or elderly, and you seem like a guy who’d drive a sports car. Number three, my son said you paid cash for an expensive dinner last night instead of using a credit card. I figure maybe you’re running from somebody.

Maybe that pretty girl’s husband?”

Her directness and perspicacity surprised him. “Nothing like that.”

“If the law or the mob’s after you, I’d rather know sooner than later.”

“It’s kind of a long story.”

“We’ve got a twelve-hour drive ahead of us.”

Eli shifted in his seat, settling in for the long ride. “Well, then…”

He told her about his job at Meditrina Vineyards, about the fungus that had killed their grapevines, and the research he’d done that showed the disease originated in France.

He explained that for years, French winemakers had been losing ground to the Californians, and that Meditrina was the rising star in the industry, winning awards and market shares that once belonged to the French.

“What’s ‘Meditrina’ mean, by the way?”

“Meditrina was the Roman goddess of wine, health, and longevity.” Wistfully, he thought about the life-sized marble statue of her at the entrance to the vineyard. “Our success turned out to be our downfall. I started spreading the word among California’s wine-growing community and blogging about my suspicions. Then one night about a month ago, somebody trashed my apartment, but the only thing they stole was my computer. A few days later, a French guy tried to knife me in the men’s room of a San Francisco restaurant.”

“How’d you know he was French?”

“His accent. He asked if I was Eli Hart, the vintner. When I said yes, he pulled a knife. I kicked his feet out from under him and slammed his head on the urinal. Another guy tried to grab me in the hall, but I chopped his Adam’s apple and ran.”

Ruby raised an eyebrow and examined him for a moment. “And I thought you were just a pretty boy.”

He shrugged. “I took a few self-defense classes.”

“Do you think they’re still hunting for you?”

“I don’t know, but I’m not taking any chances.”

He explained how he’d dashed into a costume shop near the restaurant and donned a jester suit, then kidnapped Miranda and escaped.

“Some guys will do anything to get a woman,” she said, shaking her red curls.

“I was desperate and scared.” Eli stared out the open window at the mountainous terrain. The wind ruffled his honey-colored hair. I need to get it cut, he told himself. The air was still cool, but he knew it wouldn’t stay like that for long. By midday, the temperature could reach one hundred and ten.

Ruby lit another cigarette and blew smoke shapes, not just rings but stars and trees and elephants. Eli watched for a while, trying to figure out how she did it, then gave up. “So what’s the craziest way you ever got a man?” he asked.

She laughed and her faux ruby necklace bounced on her silicone-augmented breasts. “I had one delivered to me, all wrapped up in a box.”

“You ordered a guy, like a pizza?”

“I was hauling appliances—washers, dryers, refrigerators and such. When I arrived at my destination and checked my load, I noticed one of the boxes was moving. It was making noise, too. I sliced it open with a box cutter and inside I found a man all bound up with duct tape.”

“What did you do?”

“Well, he was real cute—a young Spanish guy—so I climbed in with him. An immobilized man who couldn’t talk was just too good to pass up. I undid his pants and when he reacted favorably, I fucked him right there in the box.”

It took Eli a while to stop laughing enough to ask, “Why was he in the box?”

“He crossed a couple of bad guys who knocked him out, packaged him, and stashed him on my truck. They meant for him to end up in a warehouse and slowly die from dehydration. Of course, I cut him loose when I was done with him.”

Ruby ejected the Stevie Ray Vaughan CD and inserted one of Janis Joplin.

“Another time, a guy in a Porsche low-bridged my trailer,” she continued. “I was making a turn and the trailer stretched across both lanes of the road. It was night and raining hard. He was driving too fast. Never even saw me. That little car zipped right under my truck. Peeled his roof off, like the lid of a sardine can, but fortunately he didn’t get hurt. He managed to open one door and crawl out. I brought him into the cab while I phoned 911. I couldn’t help noticing his dick was sticking up like the Empire State Building. Turned out his kink was near-death experiences, and I don’t mean the woo-woo kind. We got it on twice before the cops showed up.”

“Driving a truck sounds pretty exciting,” Eli chuckled. “Maybe I should change professions.”

“Most of the time it’s duller than dirt,” she admitted. “But lots of guys find lady truckers hot. It’s all about power and control. A woman who can handle this humungous diesel monster is nobody’s plaything. She’s independent, gutsy, and she knows how to get where she wants to go.”

“You remind me of those pioneer women, driving their horse-drawn wagons across the Wild West.”

She patted the dashboard affectionately. “Yeah, got my five hundred horses right here.”

They drove on for a while without talking, listening to Janis belt out the blues in her raspy, soulful voice.

When the CD ended, Ruby said, “In my youth, I idolized Janis. She and I both came from the Texas coast. We were a lot alike: bad girls into sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll. I guess we must’ve been baptized in dirty water.”

“At least you didn’t end up like her.”

“Now we’re back to the subject of power and control. Janis had plenty of power, but she lacked control. That’s where we differed.” She put on a Johnny Winter CD next.

“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m playing all Texas musicians to put you in the right frame of mind.”

“The right frame of mind for what?”

“Hot weather, hot food, and hot women.” She rolled down the elastic waistband of her red stretch pants to reveal vermillion flames tattooed just above her pubic hair.

Is she coming on to me? Eli wondered.

But when Ruby saw his expression, she laughed. “Well, the fire looked hotter thirty years and sixty pounds ago.”

They stopped for lunch in Roswell, New Mexico, where a UFO supposedly crashed in 1947. The town had never forgotten the incident. Every place Eli looked, he saw pictures of aliens and flying saucers. In a restaurant designed to resemble a spaceship, he ordered a “Martian Meat” sandwich that tasted like an ordinary hamburger and washed it down with a chartreuse “Moonglow Milkshake.”

“Tell me about this winemaker you’re going to see,” Ruby said, taking a bite of her Saturn Salad. Radishes, decoratively cut with curly rings that looked as though they’d come from her hair, and dotted clumps of iceberg lettuce.

“He calls himself Coyote Fortuna. We worked together at Meditrina before he founded Fortuna Vineyards.”

“What makes you think he can help solve your problem?”

“He knows about diseases that affect grapevines. And because he started his vineyard with some old vines he brought over from France—or stole, if you believe industry gossip.” Eli pensively stirred his milkshake with a straw. “He’s very cool and clever. I wish I had his composure—I’ve never seen him lose his temper.”

Ruby smiled and nodded in the direction of her eighteen-wheeler. “Temper’s like that big rig out there. Lose control of it and you can do a hell of a lot of damage.”

Eli couldn’t remember ever seeing a more desolate place than West Texas.

Tumbleweeds rolled lazily across the highway. Cacti dotted the landscape. Oil well pumps that looked like huge prehistoric birds pecked the parched red clay. The towns they passed through were few and far between, composed of little more than a handful of rundown buildings, old trailers, and an occasional gas station or convenience store. I sure wouldn’t want to break down out here, he thought.

He slept for a while, and when he woke up the flat land had given way to rugged hills. The blazing sun was sinking behind them. ZZ Top wailed through the speakers and Ruby tapped the steering wheel in time to the music. He stretched his legs and rolled his head from side to side to ease the stiffness in his neck.

“Sweet dreams?” she asked.

“Frustrating, actually.”

“Do tell.”

“I was with Miranda, back in Santa Fe, and she was naked except for her cowgirl boots. I desperately wanted to make love to her, but I couldn’t because I was a little green Martian and I didn’t have a cock.”

Ruby laughed and her jewelry jiggled. “I wonder how those ETs do it.”

“Maybe they don’t. Maybe they’re reproduced in petri dishes or stamped out like widgets on an assembly line.”

“I’m glad I’m an Earthling.”

By the time they reached Fredericksburg, dusk had settled over the quaint town with its wide main street and century-old stone buildings.

“Where do you want me to let you off?” she asked.

“The Comfort Inn. Do you know where it is?”

She nodded. “It’s just up ahead.”

Eli grabbed his backpack as they pulled into the parking lot. “Thanks again for the ride. It was interesting, to say the least.”

“Good luck solving your mystery. Take care of yourself.”

“I will.”

They shook hands and Ruby said, “I want to leave you with one last bit of Lone Star wisdom. What do you call a Texas woman who can suck the chrome off a trailer hitch?”

“I don’t know.”

“Darlin’.”

Coyote Fortuna had built a replica of a French chateau near the entrance to his vineyard, and it was there he served his Texas wine to visitors. Most of the year, tourists and locals lounged on limestone terraces overlooking Fortuna Vineyard’s seventy-two acres of Vinifera vines while listening to local bands play country-western music. During cold weather, they drank beside a fireplace large enough to roast a wild boar in, or at the antique bar rescued from a Dallas saloon.

A large man in his mid-forties, with a thick shock of silver-threaded hair, Coyote had a slender feral face that fit his name but seemed incongruous on someone his size. He raised his glass of Malbec and scrutinized its rich purple color. He and Eli had already sampled Fortuna’s Sauvignon Blanc, Zinfandel, and Merlot, and were leisurely working their way through the vineyard’s repertoire.

“Well, what do you think?” he asked Eli.

“Not bad, actually. A little thin, but better than I’d expected.”

Coyote snorted. “Napa snob.”

“You want me to kiss your ass or be honest?”

“Kiss my ass, of course.” Coyote laughed. “Okay, I know Texas winemakers still have some catching up to do. We’ll get there. As you say, though, this 2005 isn’t bad. Not bad at all.”

The afternoon sun scorched the fields and burned the back of Eli’s neck. He slid his chair over a couple of feet, into the shade. He understood why the cold-sensitive Vinifera vines grew well in this climate. Coyote had intermingled them with the hardy, native V. berlandieri, which resisted the deadly root disease Phylloxera. Both appeared to be thriving.

Eli was about to bring up the subject of vine diseases when a petite young woman, whose erect posture and air of purpose made her seem bigger than she was, joined them on the terrace. She wore tight black slacks and a white blouse with enough buttons undone that he could see the swell of her breasts. A sprig of lavender was clipped in her dark hair.

“Do you remember Giselle Constant?” Coyote said.

Giselle had worked at Meditrina only briefly, until Coyote lured her away with promises of money and success. Although Eli had never really gotten to know her, she wasn’t the sort of woman men forgot. He stood and extended his hand. “Nice to see you again.”

When her eyes met his, he felt an instant sense of connection that went all the way down to his balls. She reached for his hand, but instead of shaking it she turned it up and studied the tattoo on his palm.

“What’s this? A lucky charm?” she asked, a trace of Cajun music in her voice.

“I guess you could call it that. It represents my link to Mother Earth and her abundance.”

“Has it helped you make your mark in the world?”

“The wine business has been good to me,” he acknowledged, trying to keep his eyes from straying to her cleavage. “Not as good as it’s been to Coyote, though.”

“You think you’d like to have your own vineyard?”

“Well, sure. But that’s way out of my league.” I’ll be lucky if I can continue working in the industry.

“Has Coyote given you a tour of the operation?”

“He showed me the fermentation room, the cellar, and the tasting room. We haven’t made it out into the vineyard yet.”

“You’ll have to let me show you the reception hall and function rooms.”

“Giselle handles all our events—weddings, banquets, parties.” Coyote gazed at her with obvious affection, but she didn’t seem to notice.

Is their relationship more than professional? Eli wondered.

She tilted her head to one side and smiled coyly at Eli. “I want you to see my beautiful pussy, too.”

He almost dropped his wineglass. Did I hear her right?

Coyote grinned and explained. “She means her pet mountain lion.”

“You keep a mountain lion as a pet?”

Giselle laughed lightly. “She’s quite tame, really. You’ll see. Now I must get back to work.” She started walking across the stone terrace, then stopped short and turned around. “Coyote, I hope you invited Eli to spend the night.”

“We’ve got several guest cottages,” he said, picking up the ball. “You’re welcome to stay.”

“Thanks, I appreciate it.”

She smiled her approval. “Good. I’ll take you there after I finish with my e-mail.”

Fortuna Vineyards’ guesthouses resembled pioneer log cabins. Giselle led Eli to the one furthest from the other facilities. She unlocked the door and opened it. Except for a modern bathroom and flat-screen TV, the rustic interior reminded him of an old Western movie set.

Eli put his backpack down on a chair upholstered in Axis deer hide. He was about to bring up the subject of her relationship with Coyote, but she beat him to it.

“We’re not lovers, in case you’re wondering,” she said. “He’d like us to be, but although I respect him, I don’t find him attractive. I have my own apartment above the reception hall.”

Her directness surprised Eli, and pleased him. “I’m glad to hear it.”

She laid her hand lightly on his arm; her touch sent sparks shooting through his body. Her eyes held promises he hoped would materialize.

“Let’s go meet Bast,” she said.

“Bast?”

“My lioness. She’s named for the Egyptian cat goddess.”

Giselle led the way to a high-fenced arena where a half-grown mountain lion stretched out on the fallen trunk of a dead oak tree. As they approached, the cat climbed down and padded over to them. Giselle stuck her hand through the fence and stroked the animal’s forehead, murmuring softly to it. The lioness purred like a kitten in response.

“She is beautiful,” Eli said. “Can I pet her?”

“No, she only lets me.” Bast rubbed her face on the fence. “I saved her life. Someone had shot her. I nursed her back to health.”

“Doesn’t she want to return to the wild?”

“She doesn’t seem to. I take her out for a walk every day. If she wanted to get away, she could. Cats have good memories—she knows it’s dangerous out there.” Giselle scratched the lioness behind her ears. “Besides, she has a good life here. Plenty to eat, lots of love. Wild animals don’t get that.”

Bast lay down and rolled around on the ground, dusting her tawny fur with red dirt. Eli mentally compared the delicate woman beside him to the powerful animal.

“Aren’t you afraid she’ll turn on you one day?”

“No,” Giselle answered. “We respect each other. And anyway, strength isn’t just brute force. Gandhi said ‘Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from indomitable will.’ I’d add to that knowledge, perseverance, and the ability to control your emotions rather than letting them control you.” She gave Eli a sagacious smile. “That’s what got me out of the Louisiana swamps and into a six-figure job.”

“Texas has more than two hundred wineries,” Coyote told Eli as they strolled between the rows of grapevines. In the setting sun, the green-gold leaves glowed like bronze above the iron-red soil. “Our warm days, cool nights, and low humidity are perfect for growing grapes.”

“You seem content here.”

“It’s an easier life. Friendly people, relaxed pace. Sure, there’s competition between wineries, but it’s not like California.”

Eli plucked a grape and squeezed it, letting the juice drip between his fingers.

“What are the down sides?”

“Water’s the biggest one. We have an irrigation system, but a little more rain would sure be welcome.”

Easing into the subject foremost in his mind, Eli said, “You know about Meditrina’s problems with the Mort Jaune, I assume.”

Coyote examined the leaves on a couple vines, as if checking for the telltale yellowing caused by the fungus. “Yeah, I heard.”

“Your vines are of French origin. Any signs of it here?”

“Nope. So far Meditrina’s the only place in this country that’s been hit. But it can take a few years to show up, so we might see more outbreaks in the future.”

“Don’t you find it odd that Meditrina’s the only American vineyard with the disease?” Eli asked. He waited for his former colleague to answer, and when he didn’t, continued, “I think someone intentionally infected our vines.”

“I know. I read your comments on the blogs.” The big man pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead. “Do you have any proof, or just suspicions?”

“We both know the French are pissed off because California’s wineries are taking business and awards away from them.”

“Hell, the French have been pissed off since the Americans sent them Phylloxera back in the mid-1800s.”

Eli told Coyote about his apartment getting ransacked and the two Frenchmen who’d assaulted him in San Francisco. “They knew who I was. It wasn’t a random attack or a hold-up gone bad.”

Coyote mulled it over for a few moments before asking, “If they wanted to make a statement, why target Meditrina instead of the big wineries?”

“I’ve considered the same thing. Which makes me wonder if somebody has a particular grudge against Meditrina.”

The sun slid below the horizon, splashing the sky with streaks of vivid pink and purple.

Coyote paused to watch the spectacle. “One of the things I like best about Texas is the sky.” After a minute or so of silent observation, he said, “Maybe you’re making too much of this French connection thing. Could just be a coincidence. Or bad luck.”

“Troy suggested that too, but I disagree. Whoever infected our vines had to have motive, means, and opportunity.”

The brilliant colors faded as rapidly as they’d appeared. “Let’s head back,”

Coyote said. “Giselle will be holding up dinner for us.”

After a Texas-style supper that included steaks so big they hung over the edges of the plates, pie made with fresh local peaches, and copious quantities of wine, Coyote stretched out on the huge leather sofa and promptly fell asleep. Eli helped Giselle carry their dishes into the kitchen.

“Just leave the dishes,” she said. “I’ll walk to the guesthouse with you.”

“Thanks for your hospitality,” Eli said as they stepped out into the peaceful night.

She took his arm. “I’m glad you could come visit, even if it’s only for a few days. What’s next on your itinerary?”

“I’m going to San Antonio, then New Orleans. After that, I don’t know. I’d like to go back to Napa, if that’s possible.”

“Well, if you change your mind about Napa, I’m sure we could find a place for you here.”

“Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”

The air had cooled off considerably in the past few hours. Overhead, millions of stars glittered in the big, black sky.

“I understand what Coyote meant,” he said. “The sky is amazing.”

“After being here, I can’t imagine ever living in a city again.”

“Cities aren’t my thing either,” he said, holding the cabin door for her.

Inside, she lit a lamp beside the bed, then closed all the curtains. Without a word she began unbuttoning her blouse. Her bright red fingertips flicked down the starched white cotton like drops of blood. By the time she’d finished, revealing full breasts overflowing her underwire bra, Eli’s cock was as hard as a crowbar.

Giselle unhooked her bra and cast it aside, baring a stunning pair of breasts.

Cupping them in her hands, she offered them to him. “Rub my tits with your talisman. I want you to give me good luck.”

Eagerly, he caressed her smooth flesh with his tattooed palm while he sucked her nipples until they were as dark and hard and big as purple grapes.

“And now I’m going to show you my other beautiful pussy,” she said, her voice a low growl. Like a lioness, he thought, watching her strip off her slacks.

Through her white lace bikinis he could see her black triangle. Kneeling before her, he pressed his face to her mound, inhaling her scent. Like warm earth and damp moss. He pulled the thin fabric aside to lick her wet slit. Then he ripped off her panties and pushed her onto the bed.

She propped herself up on the pillows and spread her legs, knees bent. While he shed his clothing, she toyed with her pussy. The magenta lips peeking from her dark curls glistened with her juice. Eli’s cock aimed toward her, magnetized like the arrow on a compass.

She opened her legs wider. “You like it, don’t you.” It wasn’t a question.

“It’s magnificent.”

She pinched her nipples and grinned at Eli. “Want to fuck my beautiful tits?”

In an instant, he was on top of her, his cock pumping her cleavage, his tongue lapping her cunt, while she stroked his balls, his perineum, his ass.

“It tastes better than any wine you’ve ever drunk, doesn’t it?” she purred as he sucked her clit.

“Mmmmm.”

Eli heard the nightstand drawer open, then the sound of foil tearing.

“Turn around,” she ordered.

He did, and Giselle fit a condom over the head of his swollen cock. Underneath him, she shifted her position, pushing herself up on all fours so he could mount her from behind. Like a lion, he thought again as he sank into her. Squeezing her tits, he thrust again and again, while she growled and snarled and yowled like a wildcat. He bit the back of her neck. She tightened around him and let out an inhuman shriek, her contractions milking his cock. Howling his own pleasure, he came with such force, he nearly passed out.

Afterwards, as they lay together in the dark, she asked, “How’s Troy? All I know is what I read in industry publications.”

“He’s okay.” Eli wondered how many people knew about Giselle’s affair with Meditrina’s CEO. Does Coyote?

“Still married to his ice princess?”

“As far as I know.”

Giselle eased herself out of bed, switched on the lamp, and started dressing.

“Can’t you stay?” he asked.

“I have to get up early.” She shook out her shoes before putting them on. “Watch out for scorpions—don’t walk around barefoot.”

“Will I see you in the morning?”

She brushed a kiss on his forehead. “Most definitely.”

As she closed the cabin door behind her, Eli noticed the sprig of lavender lying on the pillow.

Centuries before whites settled in Arkansas, the native people considered the Ouachita Mountains sacred. Many different tribes came to the natural mineral springs in the “Valley of the Mists” to drink and bathe in the healing waters, putting aside their differences temporarily to enjoy this mystical spot in peace.

Driving through the valley, Miranda could easily understand why her father’s older brother had made his home here. His real name was Bradaigh, which meant

“spirited” in Gaelic, but she’d always called him Uncle Bright because as a young child she’d seen a halo of light glowing around his head. People described Bradaigh Malone as an old hippie, a loner, a hermit. White hair hung below his shoulders and his beard cascaded down his chest. Beneath shaggy eyebrows, piercing blue eyes shone like beacons. He walked with a limp—the legacy of an injury sustained in Vietnam—and used a tall staff he’d carved from an ash branch to support himself.

Miranda drove across a narrow bridge that arched over a stream, then climbed a dirt road up a seemingly endless hill to her uncle’s house. She hadn’t been here since before her father became ill, seven years ago; the road had deteriorated significantly since then. It must be impossible to get in or out during the winter, she thought. He probably likes it that way.

Uncle Bright was weeding his vegetable garden when she pulled up in front of the house. He waved and stood up slowly. Omar, his mixed lab-golden retriever, raced to greet her by sticking his nose in her crotch.

“How was your trip, Sunshine?” her uncle asked. He’d nicknamed her Sunshine because he said she lit up his life.

“Long,” Miranda answered, hugging him with one arm while she tried unsuccessfully to fend off the friendly dog. “It’s still hard for this New England girl to get used to such big states.”

“It still seems strange to me sometimes, too. But then, I hardly ever go anyplace.”

He reached for his staff, which he’d propped against the garden fence. “Are you hungry?”

“Very.”

“C’mon in, then. I’ll get dinner together.”

Miranda fetched her suitcase from the car and followed her uncle into the house.

While he busied himself in the kitchen, she climbed up a ladder to a loft guestroom and unpacked a few things. The room looked the same as she remembered it: a double bed with pine cone finials and a patchwork quilt, a small dresser, a nightstand holding an old oil lamp that had been converted to electricity, and about a zillion crystals.

A large chunk of smoky quartz sat on the dresser; an amethyst cluster rested on the nightstand. More crystals perched on the windowsill, twinkling in the late afternoon sun.

They reminded her of the crystals in the secret pyramid she’d visited with Lancelot Lucas. That memory triggered a pleasant tingling between her legs. I’ll think about that later, she told herself, pushing the images aside . She washed her face and brushed her hair, then went back downstairs to join her uncle.

More crystals adorned Uncle Bright’s living room and kitchen. Stones of various sizes, shapes, and colors rested on every surface. Clear quartz pillars as big as half-gallon milk cartons stood like sentries on the mantel. A bowling ball-sized sphere shone on the coffee table. The house seemed to buzz with their energy. He doesn’t think of them as pretty baubles, she reminded herself, they’re his extended family.

“We’re having roast chicken, yellow squash, green beans, and salad. Hope that’s okay,” Uncle Bright said. “You get to sample my first tomatoes of the summer.”

“Sounds great,” she answered, trying not to picture the capon they were about to eat walking around in the yard this morning. “How can I help?”

“You can set the table.”

Miranda laid out placemats, silverware, plates, and glasses. In her uncle’s sideboard she found a stash of candles. On impulse, she fitted two beeswax tapers into brass holders and placed them on the table. Then she helped carry platters and bowls brimming with food to the dining room.

Omar took up residence beside Uncle Bright’s chair, hoping for a handout. His tail beat a steady rhythm, like a metronome, on the pine floor.

“I want to hear all about your travels,” her uncle said as he spooned homegrown vegetables onto their plates.

“So far this trip has been everything and nothing that I’d expected.”

She recounted her visits to the usual tourist sites—Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, the Painted Desert—leaving out potentially eyebrow-raising segments. As she filled Uncle Bright in on her journey and the interesting people she’d met, she considered ways to explain her relationship with Eli. I’m not even sure about it myself, she had to admit. Maybe I’ll save that discussion for another time.

When she’d finished her travelogue, he asked, “How’s everyone back home?”

Miranda took a second helping of chicken. “Okay, I guess,” feeling herself stiffen.

“Are you getting along any better with your mom and Kelly, now that Danny’s gone?”

While her father was sick, Uncle Bright came back to Salem several times to visit.

He’d been a great help to her, especially at the end. A lot more help than my mother and sister, she thought bitterly. “I really haven’t seen much of them since the funeral,” she answered.

“You know, Sunshine, people cope with grief in different ways.”

“I doubt Mom really cares he’s gone. She’s got her new husband now. And Kelly’s such a self-centered brat, she never thinks of anyone but herself.”

She knew if she looked at him, his eyes would hold nothing but understanding.

But she kept her gaze focused on her dinner. She ate some squash, then a bite of salad.

“These tomatoes are delicious,” she said, trying to change the subject.

Her uncle, however, wasn’t ready to let it go yet. “Holding a grudge dims your own radiance. Anger and resentment are like grime coating a light bulb. Forgiveness washes away that dirt so the light can shine brightly again.”

“I know, I know. A grief counselor told me holding on to grievances is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die.”

“That’s a pretty good analogy.” He smiled and patted her hand. “Never forget, Sunshine, that you are a light bearer. You have a job to do: to shine the light of love into the darkness of fear. Fear, hatred, and anger deplete our vitality. Love keeps us alive.”

“Easier said than done.”

“All you have to do is remember the good things about a person. Try to see what’s luminous in them, rather than dwelling on what you don’t like.”

“All?” Miranda smiled back at him. “After you first told me I was a light bearer, when I was just a little girl, I went around for days pointing a flashlight at people and telling them to go here or there. I thought that’s what ‘lighting the way’ meant. It seemed the most wonderful job anyone could possibly have.”

“And so it is. But now you know the only way to guide others is by example.”

Lying in bed that night, Miranda contemplated what her uncle had said: “Love keeps us alive.” She remembered how devastated her father had been when her mother left him, how all the joy drained out of him. Not long afterwards, he’d been diagnosed with cancer.

Was there a connection? she wondered. The possibility really pissed her off. If it’s true, Mom didn’t just divorce Dad — she killed him.

She tried to move beyond the anger, as Uncle Bright recommended, and focus on good things about her mother. Okay, she brought me into the world, Miranda acknowledged grudgingly. She searched for positive memories and surprisingly came up with quite a few: shopping for new school clothes, hunting for seashells at the beach, finger-painting together and crayoning in coloring books. Mom encouraged my artistic talent. The admission improved her attitude slightly. And she never told me my only role in life was to be someone’s wife or mother.

That thought segued into thoughts about Eli. She contemplated her father’s premonition, a few days before he died: “Your future husband will hold the world in the palm of his hand.” And she thought of Eli’s tattoo of Mother Earth. Is he really the one? What would Dad think of him?

In her mind’s eye, she saw the tattoo on Eli’s palm and imagined it caressing her.

She recalled an afternoon at Sybil’s place, lying together on the soft grass in a clearing in the woods, surrounded by wildflowers and birdsong. Sunshine warmed their naked bodies. Eli’s strong hands stroked her with exquisite slowness, savoring every inch of her.

She remembered the sweet fragrance of honeysuckle and the fresh, clean scent of the sun-kissed grass. They provided the background for a stronger, headier aroma: the smell of Eli’s hot skin. The slight saltiness of his sweat and the rich musk of his arousal intoxicated her. She pressed her cheek against his chest, inhaling his maleness as his hands slid up the insides of her thighs. Running her tongue along his collarbone, the hollow at the base of his neck, she tasted the tanginess of his rising passion.

Miranda sighed as a delicious heat spread through her groin. She felt herself softening, melting like warm syrup. Pretending her fingers were his, she ran them along her seam and played with her clit. She imagined the head of his cock rubbing the swollen lips of her pussy. As she plunged a finger into her opening, she fantasized him sliding inside, his hard shaft filling her, and she came in a blaze of colored lights that tickled her skin like Fourth of July sparklers.

The air felt humid and close as Miranda and Uncle Bright hiked to his favorite crystal field. A large vein of high-grade quartz ran through his forty acres, near enough to the surface that he could harvest stones with relatively little effort. He earned a modest living gathering them from this site and selling them to gem and mineral shops, new age stores, museums, and collectors around the country.

“Some of the finest crystals in the world are right in my back yard,” he’d proudly explained the first time he took her digging with him, more than twenty years ago. “Only Brazil rivals Arkansas as a source for quality quartz crystals.”

Periodically, he plowed up a section of his land to unearth buried crystals. Each time he did, hundreds of tiny clear stones emerged from the beds where they’d lain since prehistoric times. The bigger, more valuable ones, however, nestled deeper in the ground—those he had to dig out with a shovel or dislodge with a crowbar.

The night’s rain had washed the area clean, making it easier to spot crystals lying about on the ground. As a child, Miranda thought the sparkling stones were fallen stars.

They still amazed her, the way they peeked out of the soil as if they’d been planted there.

Well, maybe they had. Her uncle once told her that millennia ago, beings from other galaxies had programmed certain types of crystals with ancient wisdom, then seeded the Earth with them, hoping one day the knowledge would benefit humans. She didn’t really believe him, but the idea intrigued her.

And anyway, who knew?

As Miranda slogged across the field, the damp soil sucked at her feet, threatening to pull off the too-big rubber boots he’d loaned her. Now and again she bent down, plucked a crystal from the dirt, and dropped it in the bucket she carried. Omar bounded ahead of her, flicking up mud with his big paws.

“It’s amazing how perfect these are,” she said, holding a crystal up to the sun. “If you didn’t know better, you’d think they were cut and polished like diamonds to form such smooth, symmetrical sides and points.”

“I’ve found some diamonds here, too, you know,” Uncle Bright said, poking the soil with his carved staff. “Keep your eyes open, Sunshine—you could stumble upon a gem fine enough to make you a rich woman.”

Although the occasional diamond he discovered might garner more money than the other stones, Miranda knew the quartz crystals were his true loves. His house testified to that. He even kept a crystal in the glove compartment of his truck and carried one he called his “companion” in his pocket.

“Let’s try here.” Uncle Bright jabbed his shovel into the soft earth. As if on command, Omar began digging beside him.

She laughed, watching the dog earnestly attack the ground. “What a great helper you’ve got.”

“That he is. He earns his keep.”

Miranda raked the loose soil, separating the stones from the dirt. She’d nearly filled her bucket when Omar turned up a crystal half the size of her hand. She picked it up and wiped it on her jeans.

“Oh, look at this one,” she said, handing it to Uncle Bright. “It’s a beauty, don’t you think?”

He smiled and passed it back to her. “I think that one has your name on it.”

As she gazed at it, she saw images moving within the crystal. How strange, she thought. Looking closer, she could distinguish a horse-drawn carriage with two men and a woman in it. A second carriage bearing three male passengers followed behind the first one. In the background, a dark man rode a rearing horse. Watching them, she felt an inexplicable sense of foreboding and danger. What the hell? Then just as suddenly as the images had appeared, they vanished.

Miranda shook her head to clear it and closed her fingers around the crystal.

Instead of dropping it into the bucket with the others, she slipped the crystal into her pocket.

An hour out of Hot Springs, the rain began falling hard and grew steadily worse as Miranda drove east. Even at top speed, her wipers couldn’t keep the windshield clear.

It’s like being in a car wash. I should’ve stayed with Uncle Bright until tomorrow, she scolded herself. It didn’t look this bad when I checked the weather forecast. The wind had picked up, too, buffeting her little Kia about. She scanned the radio for an updated report, but all she got was static.

Squinting through the downpour, she searched vainly for a place to pull off the narrow country road. Maybe the deluge will let up after a while. She tapped her brakes as she rounded a curve, and felt the car hydroplane. The rear end fishtailed and pulled her across the oncoming lane. Struggling to control the vehicle, Miranda turned into the skid.

Luckily no one was coming in the opposite direction, and she sighed as the car righted itself. She eased off the accelerator and plowed on.

By the time she saw the fallen tree, it was too late. Instinctively, she cut the wheel to the left. The impact crunched the passenger side and spun her around. Unable to get a purchase on the wet pavement, the car skated off the road, landing nose down in a drainage ditch. The engine stalled.

Muddy water swirled across her windshield. At least I’m not hurt. She switched on her emergency flashers. Good, they still work. With shaking hands, she dug her cell phone out of her purse and flipped it open, only to discover she was out of range.

“Shit, shit, shit!” she swore. “What the hell am I going to do now?”

The only thing she could do, it seemed, was sit and wait, and hope someone came along to rescue her. Eventually, the rain would stop. Then she noticed the water was rising, inching up the doors. If it gets much higher, I won’t be able to open the door.

Would I be safer inside the car or outside? The idea of standing out in the pummeling rain held little appeal.

Just when she’d decided to remain inside and take her chances, the Kia shifted its position and sank deeper into the ditch. Water seeped in around the doors. Time to evacuate. She leaned against the driver’s side door, trying to force it open, but the pressure of the water held it fast. The crumpled passenger door wouldn’t budge either.

Yanking the keys from the ignition, she flipped the trunk lever and heard it spring open.

She slung her purse over her shoulder, scrambled across the console, and unlatched the fold-down back seats.

As she crawled into the trunk, the rushing water tugged at the car, undermining its precarious hold on the embankment. She pushed the trunk lid open and climbed out. Rain pelted her head and shoulders. Wind whipped at her hair. She slipped on mud and fell against the rear fender, banging her hip hard. Water sluiced around her ankles. Grabbing her suitcase, she heaved it out onto the wet ground. She dug her hands and feet into the soggy earth, dragging the suitcase behind her as she clawed her way toward the road.

Blinded by the rain, she felt the pavement before she saw it. She stood up, holding her hand to her forehead to shield her eyes, as the Kia tore away from the embankment and went bobbing downstream.

Tears ran down her cheeks, blending with the rain. What if the water comes up over the road? she worried. There’s no higher ground to climb to.

She was just about to start reciting Hail Marys when she spotted two white lights shining weakly through the rain. Over the roaring storm, she could hear the growl of a diesel engine. As the truck approached, its headlights picked out the tree lying in the road. Miranda hurried toward the tree, waving her arms. Her heart hammered against her ribs.

The big dualie slowed and stopped. The driver’s door swung open and a tall man wearing a cowboy hat stepped out.

“You okay?” he yelled.

“My car got washed away,” she shouted back.

The man grabbed her arm and picked up her suitcase. “What happened?”

he asked as he helped her into the truck.

She told him how she’d hit the tree and skidded into the drainage ditch, barely escaping before the water carried off her car. “I’m awfully glad you showed up when you did.”

“Lucky you didn’t drown. These flash floods can be treacherous. I’ve seen ’em sweep away double-wides.” His windshield wipers slashed at the rain as he studied the fallen tree. “I think there’s enough room to drive around.”

He shifted into gear and eased forward, testing the soft shoulder to make sure it would hold the dualie’s weight as he maneuvered around the obstacle. When they’d cleared it, he braked and got out. Miranda heard him rummaging in the truck bed. What’s he doing? she wondered. A few minutes later he got back in the cab, drove a couple of car lengths, then stopped again.

Seeing her confusion, he explained, “Moving the tree off the road. Don’t want someone else to hit it.”

He climbed out into the rain once more to untie the tree. When he returned, he was soaked to the bone like Miranda. He tossed his dripping cowboy hat on the back seat and she finally got a good look at him. Strong jaw, high cheekbones, a slightly hooked nose. Black hair and coppery skin. Might have some Indian blood, she thought. He probably wasn’t much older than her, but fine lines already etched the corners of his brown eyes, the legacy of years spent in the sun. His wet shirt clung to his muscled torso, the body of a man accustomed to physical work.

He handed her a box of Kleenex. “Wish I could offer you a towel, but that’s all I’ve got.”

“Thanks for rescuing me. You’re my knight on a white charger.”

“It’s a Dodge Ram.”

Miranda laughed and wiped her face, then introduced herself.

“Clint Jackson,” he said. “What’s a lady like you doin’ out in this weather?”

“I was on my way to San Antonio. Now I’m not sure. There’s the little matter of the car…Fortunately, it’s a rental.”

“When we come to the next town you can report it, and we’ll see about gettin’ you another one.”

Clint waited with her while she explained what had happened and filled out a mound of paperwork.

“Sorry, ma’am,” the rental car agent apologized. “We won’t have another car available ’til tomorrow afternoon.”

“What am I going to do until then?” she groaned, staring out at the rain.

Clint touched her arm lightly. “I’ve got an idea, if you’d care to hear it.”

“What is it?”

“Well, I’m headed to do a little gamblin’ at a riverboat casino on the Texas-Louisiana border. You’d be welcome to come along.” He turned to the agent. “Could you arrange for this lady to pick up a car at Lake Caddo?”

“No problem.”

Miranda weighed her options. She could check into a motel and watch TV while she waited for a car, or she could spend an evening with a tall, dark, handsome man and maybe win some money along the way. It didn’t take her long to decide.

“You’re on,” she agreed.

The agent passed her another stack of paperwork and made a phone call. “You’re all set.”

Designed to resemble the paddlewheel riverboats that steamed through Lake Caddo in the mid-1800s, the Lucky Lady featured two decks for gaming. A third level held a restaurant, several bars, and a number of sleeping chambers. As they stepped inside, Miranda felt dazzled by the flashing lights, booming music, and the omnipresent click-and-whir of slot machines. Hundreds of men and women clustered around tables playing roulette, poker, and craps. Others sat trance-like before the one-armed bandits.

Scantily clad waitresses maneuvered between them, balancing trays of drinks. Now and again, a shout rose above the din as a player scored a win.

“What’s your passion?” Clint asked, taking her arm.

“I don’t know. I’ve never gambled before.”

He grinned at Miranda and winked. Now that he’d changed clothes and dried his hair, he looked even better than before. “Well, how ’bout I introduce you to mine?”

He purchased chips in various denominations and led her to a table marked with red-and-black numbered boxes. A wheel turned lazily as four men and a woman contemplated their bets.

“Put this on your favorite number.” He handed her a five-dollar chip.

Miranda laid it on twenty-two. My birthday. Clint slid a chip marked $25 beside hers, then set another at the intersection of squares eight, nine, eleven, and twelve. When everyone had placed their bets, the croupier spun the wheel, sending a ball bouncing about until it settled into slot twenty-two.

“You won!” Clint exclaimed.

“Beginner’s luck,” she said, trying to sound modest. But as the croupier passed her $185 in chips and slid a much larger stack toward Clint, she felt like jumping up and down.

Clint raised her hand to his lips and kissed it, pressing a hundred-dollar chip into her palm. His dark eyes sparkled. “Can you do it again?”

“I’ll try.” She put the chip on number twenty-nine. My age.

He set an identical chip at the corner of squares twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-eight, and twenty-nine. Again the croupier spun the wheel. When it slowed, the ball rested on number twenty-nine.

“Yes!” Clint jabbed his fist into the air, his face flushed with excitement.

He picked Miranda up and spun her around as the croupier slid stacks of multicolored chips toward them. The thrill of the win and the heat of his body made her feel wild and reckless.

“Place your bets,” the croupier said.

When Miranda slid a chip onto a square, not only Clint but several other players followed her lead. This time, however, the ball skipped over her number. She guessed wrong the next time, too. But twice afterwards, she scored again. The tower of chips before her grew taller and taller. A small crowd gathered at the table, calling out encouragement. The atmosphere buzzed with electricity.

Clint stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders, his hard cock pressed against her butt. Heat waves rippled up and down her thighs. Her pussy throbbed in anticipation.

“One more time, baby,” he whispered in her ear.

Miranda pushed a stack of chips onto square thirty-six. The number of days I’ve been on this journey. The croupier spun the wheel. The ball danced, dropping into one slot then bouncing out again and into another. Finally it settled on number thirty-six.

Clint whooped and pulled her tight against him. Feeling giddy, she kissed him, tasting his excitement. My head’s spinning like that wheel.

He tipped the croupier, then scooped up their chips and cashed them in. When he handed her a fistful of hundred-dollar bills, she squealed, “Oh my God!”

“Looks like your day turned out just fine, after all,” he grinned.

He ordered champagne sent to one of the top deck chambers and escorted her upstairs. The bottle was waiting on ice when they entered the room. Clint popped the cork and when the foam spurted out, Miranda giggled at the erotic implications.

He filled two glasses and toasted, “To my lucky lady.”

The bubbles tickled her nose and throat. Her whole body, in fact, seemed to sparkle like the golden champagne. Already she felt deliciously drunk. Clint licked champagne off her lips. She sucked his tongue into her mouth, savoring its sweetness.

He maneuvered her to the bed, kissing her neck while he unbuttoned her blouse.

Unhooking her bra, he picked up a new hundred-dollar bill and rubbed her bare breasts with it. The slight roughness made her skin tingle. Her nipples stiffened. He pulled off her skirt and caressed her belly with the bill. Then he spread her legs and stroked it along the insides of her thighs. Longing to be rid of her panties, Miranda arched her mound toward him, moaning softly. He laughed and pressed the C-note to her wet crotch. How can cold cash feel so hot? she wondered.

Her hands explored his taut stomach muscles, his chiseled chest, his strong back.

His cock strained against his jeans. She freed it and it stood up, twitching like an angry rattlesnake. Grabbing another hundred-dollar bill, she palmed his stiff shaft with it until drops of fluid oozed from the tip.

As she licked the glistening drops from the purple head, he slid off her panties.

His thumbs parted her pussy lips. His tongue teased her clit ands probed her opening.

Lightning bolts shot through her body as she came in his mouth.

Quickly, he slipped on a condom and plunged inside, riding her through another orgasm. He lifted her hips so he could thrust deeper. When he hit bottom, she cried out and wrapped her legs around him, her fingernails digging into his back. He pumped faster and she moved with him, begging harder, harder, clinging to him as he bore into her like a jackhammer, until she exploded again and he came along with her.

After their hearts had stopped racing and their breathing returned to normal, Clint refilled their glasses with champagne. Propped up on a pile of pillows, Miranda hummed Mary Chapin Carpenter’s song, “Sometimes you’re the windshield, sometimes you’re the bug,” and thought, isn’t that the truth?

Even though they had to share the narrow sidewalks with hundreds of other tourists, Miranda saw San Antonio’s River Walk as an oasis of sunshine, trees, and flowers. Here and there, waterfalls cascaded over rocks. Shops, restaurants, and hotels lined the winding green rio and footbridges arched over it, reminding her of Venice.

“Want to take a tour boat ride?” she asked.

Eli shook his head. “Too hokey.”

She stopped in front of a busy Mexican restaurant. The tantalizing smells made her stomach growl. “Want some lunch?”

“Too crowded.”

“Okay, we’ll try somewhere else.”

“This whole place is too crowded,” he grumbled.

“Well, San Antonio is the number-one tourist destination in Texas.”

He stepped aside to dodge a stroller and bumped into a laughing couple walking a poodle. “Let’s get out of here.”

“All right, how about La Villita?” She pointed toward the historic village just above the river, where dozens of art galleries and shops occupied antique buildings made of stone and adobe.

“Do you think it will be any quieter there?”

“Probably a little.” She took his hand and led him over a footbridge. “Why are you so grouchy today?”

“I can’t take two steps without smacking into someone. And it’s hotter than hell.”

Miranda sighed dramatically. “We’ll find a quiet place where you can sit down in air conditioning.” And after we eat, we can visit the galleries.

Following her tourist map, they quickly located a restaurant rich with Old World charm and ducked inside its thick stone walls. A waiter seated them at a wooden booth and handed them menus. As Eli perused the extensive wine list, she watched his expression shift from annoyance to enthusiasm. He looks like he’s reading a good book, she thought. He was still studying it when the waiter returned to take their orders.

“I’ll have a glass of the Meditrina Pinot Noir,” he said.

“With all those choices, why don’t you try something more exotic?” Miranda asked.

“Maybe I will later. Right now I’m feeling homesick.”

So that explains his bad mood, she decided . “I’ll have a—” She almost ordered a daiquiri, then remembered the sexy Jamaican bartender she’d met in Colorado and changed her mind. “The same.”

After Eli had taken a few sips of his wine, Miranda said, “I still don’t understand why those French thugs went after you instead of your boss. It doesn’t seem fair.”

“Lots of things aren’t fair. The Coahuiltecan Indians who once lived along this river probably don’t think it’s fair that white men took over their land. The way blacks and other minorities have been treated doesn’t seem fair either. Look how many years it’s taken us to elect a black president.”

“I wonder how many more it will be before we finally elect a woman.”

As she spoke, Miranda heard the indignation in her voice. A sense of injustice burned in her chest. She thought about the women hanged during the Salem witch hunt, and the women around the world who’d suffered abuse for millennia. Although each generation offers more rights, freedoms, and opportunities to its females, the playing field still isn’t level. She waited for Eli to respond, but he seemed lost in his own thoughts.

The waiter served their lunch: buffalo burgers and sweet potato fries. Eli ordered a glass of Chateau Pique Caillou Bordeaux.

“Checking out the competition?” she asked.

“I guess you could say that.” He bit into his burger and chewed contemplatively.

After eating in silence for a few minutes, he returned to the subject of Meditrina. “The way I see it, I’ve been targeted because I know more about the day-to-day, hands-on part of the operation than Troy does. He’s a businessman, not a grower. Coyote used to oversee the vineyards. When he left to start Fortuna, I took on most of his responsibilities.”

“Is risking your neck tracking down bad guys part of your job description?”

“No, but I want to see justice done. I intend to do what’s necessary to bring that about.”

Miranda gazed at his handsome face, sea-green eyes, and golden hair. I don’t want anything bad to happen to you. Trying not to reveal her concern, she asked, “Was your friend Coyote able to offer any help?”

“Not much, but it was good seeing him and hanging out with winemakers again. I really liked his place, too.” Eli dipped a couple of fries in ketchup and popped them in his mouth.

“Sounds like you had fun.”

“Yeah, I did.”

Something in his tone set off warning signals. He seems a little too keen about it, she thought. “Do you wish you were back there instead of here?”

“Of course not.”

Now he sounds defensive. Is there something he’s not telling me? Maybe he met a woman there. She felt a pang of jealousy as she pondered the possibility. Well, I didn’t tell him everything about Clint, so I guess I don’t have a right to be upset, she rationalized. It’s not like we’ve got any sort of commitment.

“Miranda, are you okay?”

“Fine.”

Eli frowned. “When women say they’re ‘fine’ it usually means just the opposite.”

“How’s the wine?”

“Pretty good,” he said. “You changed the subject. Are you mad at me?”

“I just wanted us to have a good time, but you’ve been in a pissy mood all day.”

Tears stung her eyes. She’d invited him to meet her in San Antonio to celebrate her luck at the roulette table—her treat. However, he didn’t appear to be enjoying the experience as much as she was. Maybe I should’ve stayed at the riverboat casino with Clint.

“Sorry,” he said, stroking the back of her hand with his fingertips. “I’m hot and tired and I don’t like crowds. We did the Alamo and the Governor’s Palace this morning, then the River Walk. After we finish lunch, you’re probably going to want to poke around in all these shops and art galleries, right?”

“Well, yes…”

“How about a compromise? While you shop and visit the galleries, I’ll go back to the hotel and relax at the pool. When you’re finished, c’mon back and we’ll have a nice dinner together, wherever you want to go.”

“Can we go dancing, too?”

“That might be pushing it,” Eli said, and chuckled. “Let’s see what condition my feet are in at that point.”

After she showed him her purchases—a tooled tin cross set with colorful stones, an alligator belt studded with conchos, and a hand-painted pottery armadillo—they went downstairs to the Menger Hotel’s famous bar for a drink before dinner. They sat at a cherrywood booth and Eli ordered two of the bar’s legendary mint juleps.

Miranda admired the paneled ceiling and beveled mirrors. “I read that this is a replica of the House of Lords’ Club in London.”

“It’s also where Teddy Roosevelt recruited his Rough Riders to fight in the Spanish-American War,” he said. “I think one of his bullets is still lodged in the wall over there.”

“I wish men would find a way other than fighting to settle their differences.”

“Sometimes there’s no alternative. If a guy tries to move in on your territory and you don’t want to give it up, you have to fight him.”

“Why do people feel they have a right to take somebody else’s property anyway?

Can’t they just be satisfied with what they’ve got?”

“What if a guy doesn’t have enough to provide for his family, or his tribe? He might feel justified taking what he needs from someone who has more.”

“I guess a person can always justify his behavior if it suits his purposes,” she countered. “I bet if women ran the world, we wouldn’t have wars.”

Eli laughed. “Probably not. You’d all be too busy shopping.”

She punched him lightly on the arm. He grabbed her hand and pressed his lips to her palm, then her wrist, slowly working his way up the soft skin of her inner arm.

“Mmmm. You taste good,” he said. “We’d better go to dinner soon, otherwise I’ll have to take you upstairs and eat you instead.”

Even in July, Mi Tierra in San Antonio’s Market Square was festooned with Christmas lights. Eli and Miranda stuffed themselves with Mexican favorites—nachos, chalupas, tamales, enchiladas—then moved to the restaurant’s bar where a Mariachi quartet strolled from table to table, performing traditional music. As they sipped margaritas, a Latin dance band warmed up in the adjoining room.

Several couples were already dancing to the lively beat. Miranda tapped her foot and watched them, marveling at their grace and dexterity. Those women make it look so easy, even wearing three-inch heels.

“How do your feet feel now?” she asked.

“Better,” he said. “I still won’t be much of a partner, though. I can’t salsa or rhumba or whatever it is they’re doing.”

“Well I’m not very good at it either, but I took a few classes at an adult ed center back in Salem. I can show you the basics.”

A strikingly handsome, dark-skinned man with a moustache, who might have been forty or sixty, approached their table. He smiled and nodded at Miranda, then spoke to Eli in Spanish.

“What’s he saying?” she wanted to know.

“I think he’s asking to dance with you. Go ahead. If you want to, that is.”

Miranda accepted the man’s hand and he led her to the dance floor. “No español,” she apologized.

He shrugged and smiled, as if to say, no problem. He swept her through a rapid merengue, then a salsa and a cha-cha. Guided by his strong arms and fluid movements, she found herself flowing with the rhythm as naturally as if she’d been doing this all her life. When the man pulled her close for a tango, she glanced at Eli. Her lover wasn’t paying the slightest bit of attention to her; he was busy chatting with a couple at the next table.

If this man tried to move in and take me away, would Eli fight to keep me? she wondered. The idea went totally against her feminist sensibilities, yet something primal deep within her wished Eli would step up and claim her as his woman. As the thought flitted through her mind, another primitive part of her responded to the Mexican man’s embrace and she leaned against his agile body. A buzz of excitement stirred between her legs. I see why they call this the “dance of love.”

When the music stopped, Miranda extricated herself from the man’s arms. He raised an eyebrow and searched her face with his sparkling dark eyes, as if to say, things were just starting to get interesting.

“Gracias,” she said, smiling as she walked away. Her body still tingled from his touch. Time to collect Eli and go back to the hotel.

At this time of night, they had the Menger Hotel’s swimming pool all to themselves. The cool water felt good on her hot skin. Eli backed her to the side of the pool and pressed his hard cock against her. He opened her lips with his, his tongue seeking hers, teasing, twirling, then retreating, inviting hers to follow. She explored his warm mouth, slowly searching for and finding what she wanted, and sucked his tongue back into her own mouth.

Kissing’s like dancing, she mused.

He slid his hands inside the top of her bikini and toyed with her nipples. She sighed and wrapped her legs around his hips, grinding her pussy against his bulge. He eased off the bottom half of her swimsuit.

She giggled against his neck. “What if it floats away?”

He scooped up the tiny triangle of Spandex and hooked it over her arm. Then he freed his swollen cock from his trunks and stroked her with its head. Miranda arched against him, moaning softly. Her whole body ached with longing. Letting the water buoy her up, she opened to receive him. As he thrust into her, the hard edge of the pool bit at her back, but she barely noticed. The only sensation that mattered was the heat his piston generated as it pumped her cylinder.

Pleasure gushed through her, and she felt his cock pulsing as he came inside her.

Not until after their passion had ebbed and he’d withdrawn did it register that his cock was bare. I was so hot, I didn’t think.

She pulled away and stepped into her bikini bottom, then pushed herself out of the pool. She felt his juice leaking from her pussy. Okay, don’t get freaked out, she told herself. It’s highly unlikely that he has HIV—I’ve never known a straight man, except junkies and hemophiliacs, who got AIDS. Still, he could give me clap or chlamydia.

Eli laid his hand on her thigh. “Miranda, is something wrong? Did I come too soon?”

“We didn’t use a condom.”

“Does that worry you?”

“Should it?”

“Of course not. I’m clean. I’m always careful.”

“We weren’t this time,” she reminded him.

“Do you want me to get tested? I will if it’ll ease your mind.”

“I don’t know.”

He climbed out of the pool and sat beside her, their feet dangling in the water.

Putting his arm around her, he pulled her against him. She laid her head on his shoulder.

“Miranda, you’re special to me. I wouldn’t put you at risk. Really, it’s okay.”

Can I believe him? she wondered. If he’s my future husband, he won’t hurt me, will he? Wouldn’t Dad’s vision have shown if Eli had some kind of disease?

“I don’t want this to be a problem between us,” he said. “We’ll both get tested so we’re in the clear. Then I can stop using those damned condoms.”

When their tests came back clear, Miranda and Eli celebrated with two hours of the best sex they’d ever had together. Then they packed up and drove east on I-10.

Refineries populated Louisiana’s southwest coast like futuristic cities of steel and smoke.

Even with the car windows up, the noxious smell of petroleum and sulfur permeated the air.

“I wish I’d seen New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina,” Miranda said.

“From what I understand, the French Quarter and the Garden District didn’t suffer much damage.”

“Do you think I’m crazy for wanting to go to New Orleans in late July?”

“Yes, but you’ve got your mind made up and I’m not going to try to talk you out of it.”

She reached across the console and laid her hand on his thigh. “I’m glad you decided to come along with me. I know this isn’t something you really want to do.”

“Au contraire. I want to spend time with you, even if that means sweltering in New Orleans.”

“I booked us into a really pretty B&B, but it has, um, a dark side.”

“No electricity?"

“What I meant was, it used to be a whorehouse.”

“Used to be, ” he sighed. “Too bad…”

“…and now it’s supposedly haunted.”

Eli chuckled. “So, if I wake up in the middle of the night and a ghost is sucking my dick, I shouldn’t be too surprised?”

“If you’d rather stay someplace else, that’s okay with me.”

“Oh, hell, no. I’m looking forward to a three-way with a vampire or succubus while we’re there.” His playful grin lit up his face, making him look younger than thirty-two. “Where’d you read about this place anyway? The Anne Rice Guide to Big Easy B&Bs?”

“Very funny,” she said, but couldn’t help giggling. “Don’t make me laugh. I’ve got to pee.”

When she spotted a stretch of live oaks and cypress, bordering a stream that cut through a fallow field where cotton might once have grown, she flipped on her blinker and pulled off the road. I don’t know when I’ll find another gas station or rest stop; this will have to suffice.

Behind a sheltering oak, she pulled down her shorts and did her business. As she started to zip up, a voice sang out, “I see London, I see France. I see a lady’s underpants.”

She glanced around, but saw no one.

“Up here,” the voice called.

Miranda looked up and saw a man hanging upside down, about fifteen feet above her. A rope tied around his ankle held him suspended from the branch of the large oak tree. Tall and gaunt, he wore a pair of camouflage shorts and nothing else.

Startled, she asked, “What are you doing?”

“Just hanging around.” His voice had a peculiar lilting quality that rose and fell, accenting syllables that weren’t usually stressed.

“Out here, in the middle of noplace?”

“It’s not no place, it’s my place. I live here.”

High up, near the top of the huge old oak, Miranda noticed a wooden structure.

She could just barely make out windows and a door. “You live in this tree? Why?”

“Because I get a better view of the world from here. Come up and see for yourself.”

“Miranda, are you all right?” Eli called from the car.

“Yes, I’m talking to a man in a tree,” she called back.

She heard the car door open and shut. Eli hurried toward her.

“What the hell…?” he said, looking up at the hanging man.

“Come up and have some tea,” the man invited. “It’s cooler up here.”

“I haven’t climbed a tree since I was a little girl,” Miranda said. “I’m not sure I still know how.”

The man pulled himself upright onto the branch. “I’ll drop a ladder for you.”

He scrambled up the tree like a monkey. When he reached the tree house, he tossed a rope ladder down to them.

“You’re not going up there, are you?” Eli asked.

“Why not?”

“The guy’s obviously a nutcase. It could be dangerous.”

The whole reason for taking this journey was to have adventures, she reminded herself. She smiled sweetly at Eli. “You’ll be there to protect me.”

He sighed loudly as he followed her up the ladder. “Watch your step. It’s a long way down.”

Inside the tree house, the strange man set three cups on a low table fashioned from part of an old door. An army cot, a folding camp chair, a Coleman stove, a plastic trunk, and makeshift bookcases laden with books and canned food were the only other furnishings.

“Sit, sit,” he said, indicating cushions on the floor. “This is quite a treat for me. I don’t get many visitors.”

“I can see why,” Eli said.

The man seated himself on one of the cushions and filled the cups. “Most people aren’t willing to venture outside their comfort zones.”

Miranda introduced herself and Eli.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance. I’m Freeman.” He noticed Eli staring suspiciously at the liquid in his cup. “Don’t worry, it’s just mint tea brewed in the sun.”

“You still haven’t explained why you were hanging upside down,” she said.

“To get a different perspective,” Freeman answered. “There are things you can see more clearly upside down.”

“Oh, now I understand. I do that sometimes when I’m painting,” Miranda said. “If I turn the picture upside down, I notice things I missed before. When I view it in the usual way, my mind automatically fills in any gaps. I see what I’m prepared to see, not what’s really there.”

Freeman clapped his hands with glee. “Exactly.”

“What are you trying to see more clearly?” Eli asked.

“Myself.” Noticing Eli’s confused expression, he continued. “When we look at the world, we think we’re seeing a reality outside us. But we’re really seeing our inner selves projected outward—the world is our mirror.”

Miranda sipped her tea and contemplated Freeman’s statement. “That reminds me of a quote from Anais Nin: ‘We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are.’”

“Freeman, is it possible all that blood running into your head while you hung upside down might have messed up your thinking?” Eli suggested.

“Gee, I hope so. That’s the whole point.” Instead of taking offense, the tree dweller grinned as if Eli had said something wise. “Like Miranda said, we only see what we’re prepared to see. Did you know that when Pissaro’s ships came to the New World, the natives who had no conception of sailing ships couldn’t see them?”

A flock of butterflies fluttered in through an open window and hovered above the table. One lit on Freeman’s head, another on his shoulder. He held out his finger and a butterfly landed on it.

“What color is this butterfly?” he asked.

“Green,” Eli answered.

“No, it’s blue. Turquoise, actually,” Miranda said.

“But artists don’t see things the same way other people do,” Eli protested.

Freeman passed the butterfly to her. “Nobody sees things the same way other people do. Ask ten people who witnessed the same event what actually took place, and you’ll get ten different answers. Perception is never objective.”

Miranda examined the butterfly perched on her finger with delight, admiring its delicate wings. “Butterflies supposedly symbolize death and rebirth.”

Eli frowned. “You think these butterflies are trying to tell us something?”

“Why don’t you ask them?” Freeman replied.

Watching the butterfly glide away, Miranda said, “The Druids believed trees have symbolic meanings, too.”

“Many cultures have myths about trees as sources of wisdom,” Freeman added.

“The Buddha gained enlightenment while sitting under the Bodhi tree. The Norse god Odin hung upside down on a giant ash tree called Yggdrasil to gain divine knowledge.”

“Do you think if you hang around in this tree long enough, God will speak to you?” Eli asked.

“God speaks to me all the time,” Freeman said with a smile. “I just have to be willing to listen.”

Miranda finished her tea and nudged Eli. “We really should be on our way.

Thanks for the tea, Freeman. I’ve enjoyed meeting you.”

“Likewise.” As they climbed back down the rope ladder, he called after them, “I hope you find what you’re looking for. You’ll see it when you believe it.”

“You didn’t seem to like Freeman very much,” Miranda said as they drove through the Atchafalaya Basin. “I thought he was fun.”

The highway, built on elevated pillars, bridged eighteen miles of the desolate swamp. Bald cypress trees, mangroves, and acres of eerie broken, black trunks stood in the brackish water, reminding her of a primordial landscape where dinosaurs might roam.

“He’s a weirdo, for sure.”

“So’s your friend Sybil, and my Uncle Bright,” she reminded him. “I guess it’s all in how you look at it.”

“Now you sound like Freeman.”

“You know, I’ve been thinking we should introduce Sybil to Uncle Bright. I bet they’d get along.”

As she spoke, something akin to a YouTube video of the four of them dancing on a beach flashed through her mind. Where’d that come from? she wondered. I never used to have visions, but now I seem to be getting them quite often. She recalled her strange experience at Lee Golden’s art gallery, when she’d witnessed a past lifetime. I still don’t understand how I could see so vividly something that happened centuries ago. She contemplated her father’s vision of her future husband. Is Eli the one he meant, or have I misinterpreted everything? Past, present, and future seemed all jumbled up, like clothes tossing about in a dryer.

Eli’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Look, there’s an alligator.” He pointed at a scaly shape floating in the water.

Miranda squinted at it. “I think it’s just a log.”

“One person’s alligator is another person’s log,” he teased. “How will we ever know the truth?”

“I guess we won’t. I’m certainly not getting close enough to find out.” She turned the air conditioner up a notch. “I have to agree with Freeman to some extent, though. If you believe people are inherently good, you’ll usually meet good people. If you think the world is a dangerous place and everyone’s out to get you, that’s what you’ll experience.”

“Yeah, well, I never thought the world was a dangerous place until somebody tried to kill me.”

Miranda remembered the scene she’d viewed inside the crystal she’d found in Uncle Bright’s field. The sense of danger and foreboding welled up in her again, just thinking about it. I still have that crystal tucked away in my suitcase. Maybe I should take another look. She considered telling Eli about it, but rejected the idea. No sense worrying him about something that might only be my imagination.

Eli moaned his release, then collapsed on top of Miranda, huffing and puffing like a locomotive. Even before her heartbeat had returned to normal, he was sound asleep.

She rolled him over and slid out from under his weight. Feeling his fluids leak from her body, she crawled out of bed and padded across the B&B’s creaky wooden floor to the bathroom. She peed, pulled a chain to flush the antique toilet’s overhead tank, and swiped a wet washcloth between her legs.

When she emerged from the bathroom, she saw a young woman sitting in the rocking chair. One breast peeked from the torn bodice of a lace nightgown; her auburn hair cascaded down over the other. A dark stain spread between them.

“Oh my God!” Miranda rushed toward the woman, her initial surprise replaced by concern. “What happened to you?”

“He shot me,” the woman answered, her voice barely audible.

“Oh my God!”

When Miranda reached out to her, the wounded woman vanished. Only the rocker’s slight movement attested to her former presence. Miranda backed slowly away from the chair, her eyes wide as she searched the shadowy room. Where’d she go?

Eli’s snores rumbled behind her. Glancing around the room one last time, she made her way back to bed. I couldn’t have imagined that, she thought as her trembling hands pulled the sheet up over her naked body. I may have just seen my first ghost.

Sunlight spilled onto the porch at the rear of the B&B, where white wicker tables and chairs were arranged for breakfast. Only three other guests lingered this late in the morning.

“A ghost?” Eli asked, stirring cream into his chicory-laced coffee.

“What else could it have been? I told you this place was haunted.” Miranda broke off a piece of beignet dusted with confectioner’s sugar and popped it in her mouth.

“Why didn’t you wake me?”

“It all happened so fast.”

A heavy-set man with a puffy, florid face, seated at the table beside them, leaned toward Miranda. “You saw her too?”

“Who?” Miranda asked.

“The old lady with the big hat.”

“No.”

The man looked perplexed. “Oh, I thought you said you saw a ghost.”

"I did. Well, at least I think I did. But the woman I saw was young, with long red hair and a torn nightgown. She said, ‘He shot me,’ then disappeared into thin air."

“That’s Annalise,” a woman at a nearby table, wearing a New York Yankees T-shirt, interjected.

“Who’s Annalise?” the man asked.

“She turned tricks here, back when this B&B was a bordello,” the Yankees fan said in a nasal Brooklyn accent, omitting all her “r’s.”

Her companion, a horse-faced woman with a blond ponytail, explained, “Even though Annalise worked as a prostitute, she had a lover who was jealous of all her johns.

One night he barged into a room upstairs where she was plying her trade and shot her.”

“It had to be the room we’re in,” Eli said, rolling his eyes.

“She died a few hours later, stretched out on the divan over there,” the woman with the ponytail continued. “But the cops never charged him with the crime.”

“Now Annalise haunts her old digs, spooking visitors,” the New Yorker added.

“Maybe she’s trying to find someone to help her bring her murderer to justice,” Miranda suggested.

“It’s a little late for that,” the horsey woman snorted. “He died more than a century ago.”

“Then who’s the old girl with the fancy hat?” the fat man asked.

“She used to be the madam here,” the New Yorker answered. “They say she feels guilty about what happened.”

“Well, if Annalise shows up again, I’m going to try to get her to talk to me,” Miranda said.

Eli stuck a fork in his eggs Benedict. “Whatever for?”

“I’m curious about what it’s like to be dead. Don’t you want to know what’s on the other side?”

He laughed and shook his head. “Not until I have to.”

Before the heat reached its zenith, they visited the Audubon Zoo. After a couple of hours, however, the temperature and humidity sent them scurrying for air-conditioned comfort. Miranda suggested the Museum of Art, a white-pillared building sited amidst huge pines, magnolias, and two-hundred-year-old live oaks hung with Spanish moss.

By the time they’d finished viewing a quarter of the museum’s collection of artwork, Eli was ready for a nap.

“I can’t look at another picture,” he groaned, slumping into a chair near a window that overlooked the beautifully landscaped grounds.

“I just want to take a quick tour of the sculpture garden. It contains fifty-seven works by noted artists, including Henry Moore and Jacques Lipchitz.”

“If you spend a minute looking at each one, we’ll be here another hour.”

“I promise I won’t take that long.”

He yawned and leaned his head against the wall. “Wake me up when you’re done.”

Strolling among the sculptures, Miranda rued the fact that she was still a long way from making her mark in the art world. She’d only had a few shows so far, and group ones at that. Most of her income came from teaching high school art classes, not from sales of her paintings. The great artists’ works live on for centuries after they die, she thought. I want to leave a legacy of my own behind. She ran her hand along the smooth curves of a Moore statue. I don’t have children. None of my work hangs in museums.

Who’ll remember me when I’m gone?

New Orleans comes to life after the sun goes down. Miranda and Eli rode through the Garden District into town on the St. Charles streetcar, past elegant nineteenth-century mansions, Loyola and Tulane Universities, and Audubon Park.

He’d wanted to dine at K-Paul’s or Antoine’s, but didn’t feel like waiting in line for more than an hour for a table. Instead, they found a quiet, unpretentious restaurant tucked away on a side street. The décor featured floor-length red-checkered tablecloths, enough plants to stock a garden center, and an odd assortment of furnishings that appeared to have been gleaned from yard sales. Bessie Smith’s jazz voice wafted through the room.

A corpulent woman with skin the color of India inkberries brought them menus and glasses of ice water with lemon slices. “Catfish good t’night,” she said. “Crawfish ettoufée’s always good.”

Eli studied the menu. “A dozen clams on the half-shell to start. And a bottle of Ménage a Trois White.”

“That’s the name of a wine?” Miranda asked.

“It is. Although it sounds French, it’s from Napa Valley.” He winked at her. “I’m still thinking about a three-way with Annalise.”

She rolled her eyes, closed her menu, and stood up. “I’m going to the ladies’

room.”

He caught her wrist and pulled her toward him. “While you’re in there,” he said in a low voice, “take off your panties.”

“Oh my. What’ve you got in mind?”

He gave her a look that could’ve scalded crème brulée. “I have a fantasy I’d like to fulfill.”

When she returned, naked beneath her pink sundress, her underwear shoved into her enormous boho purse, the raw cherrystones and wine sat on the table waiting for her.

Eli scooped a clam from its shell and fed it to her. Then he forked one into his own mouth and chewed it with obvious relish.

“I want you to eat these clams while I eat your pussy,” he said.

“You mean now? Here? ”

He speared another clam and held it up for her to examine. “Look at this little beauty. Surely you see the resemblance?”

He ran the tip of his finger along the crustacean’s ridged mouth. Miranda’s pussy tingled in response, as if he were caressing her. Lewdly, he licked the clam, then slipped it in her mouth.

“Mmm,” she sighed, swallowing the shellfish.

“When our waitress returns, order blackened redfish for me,” he said, and ducked beneath the table.

She felt his hands push up her dress and gently spread her legs. When his tongue found her seam, Miranda gasped. Self-consciously, she glanced around at the other patrons. Do they have a clue what’s going on? But they all seemed immersed in their own conversations, oblivious to Eli’s seduction beneath the checkered tablecloth.

Miranda popped a clam into her mouth as Eli’s tongue flicked her slit. She sucked another juicy morsel while he sucked her clit. As her fingers slid yet another clam into her mouth, his fingers slid into her opening and stroked her g-spot.

When the rotund black woman returned to take their order, Miranda simply stared at her for a moment, uncomprehending. It took a moment to wrest her thoughts away from her cunt.

“I’ll have… crawfish etouffeé,” she said finally, struggling to keep her voice steady. “My companion…wants…oh!” Eli’s finger eased into her asshole.

The waitress frowned at her. “You okay, girl?”

“Uh, yeah, um.” Miranda ran a hand through her purple-streaked hair and squeezed Eli’s head between her thighs. His hot breath was like a bellows, fanning her flames. She clutched the edge of the table. “He’d like the… blackened redfish.”

“Y’all want gumbo wid that?”

Eli‘s lips closed over her clit. Her orgasm banged at the door. “Yes! Oh yes!”

The waitress raised one eyebrow, then shrugged and turned away as Eli brought Miranda to climax. He pumped two fingers into her, hard and fast. Stifling her cries with her napkin, she ground her pussy against his hand. She was still trembling when he emerged from under the table, his mouth glistening with her juice.

“Oh. My. God.”

Eli grinned and slurped a clam from its shell. Then he slid one into her gasping mouth.

“This is what you taste like,” he said. “Sweet, succulent, sublime, with just a hint of the sea. I’ll never again eat clams without thinking of you.”

After dinner, Miranda talked Eli into taking a ride through the French Quarter in a horse-drawn carriage. As they rolled along the streets of the Vieux Carre, music spilled from restaurants and bars.

“This is even hokier than the River Walk boats in San Antonio,” he complained.

She snuggled against him. “I think it’s romantic.”

“Fortunately, we’re not likely to run into anybody we know here.”

“We’re tourists, doing things tourists do.”

He slid his hand under her skirt and caressed her bare thigh. “I’d rather be doing things lovers do.”

“All in good time.”

He gazed at her breasts, her nipples evident through the thin fabric of her pink sundress. “This heat has one advantage—I get to look at you in skimpy clothing.”

She giggled, mentally replaying their scene in the restaurant. I can’t believe we did that!

When the half-hour ride ended, their driver stopped at Jackson Square. Another carriage pulled up behind them. As Miranda started to climb down, she noticed the statue of Andrew Jackson in the center of the park. The dark man on a rearing horse. A sudden spike of fear pierced her heart. She glanced at the carriage behind them. Two men wearing sunglasses and baseball caps had disembarked and were walking quickly toward them. The scene in the crystal!

“Eli, watch out,” she warned. “Those men coming toward us—”

One of the men reached for Miranda, but Eli hit him hard in the jaw and sent him reeling. He elbowed the second man in the stomach.

“Run, Miranda!”

With his youth and physical strength, Eli could probably outdistance the assailants. But in her strappy sandals, Miranda knew she hadn’t a chance of getting away.

She stood frozen in place, desperately trying to see a way out of her predicament.

Suddenly she remembered the golden cord she and Lancelot Lucas had knotted in the magicians’ secret pyramid. Lancelot’s words echoed in her mind. “If ever you need extra strength, all you have to do is untie a knot.” She’d stashed the cord in the bottom of her purse more than a month ago, then forgotten about it. She dragged it out and struggled with a knot, as the man Eli had elbowed lurched toward her.

Eli grabbed her arm and pulled her after him, shouting, “Run!”

The knot opened. Energy surged into her feet and legs, the force propelling her forward like a rocket’s thrust. She raced ahead of Eli across Jackson Square, around Saint Louis Cathedral, and down Rue de Royale.

After several blocks, Miranda spotted a tall, wrought-iron gate standing ajar; it led into a walled courtyard. They ducked inside and slammed the gate behind them. A latch clanked into place. Huddling in the shadows, they gasped for breath, inhaling the heady scent of jasmine that perfumed the air. Slowly her panic subsided.

When he could talk again, Eli asked, “Are you okay?”

“Yes, are you?”

“My hand hurts some, but otherwise I’m fine.” He rubbed the knuckles he’d used to punch their attacker. “Were you the star sprinter on your college track team? I’ve never seen a girl run like that.”

“Well, not exactly.” Miranda realized she was still clutching the gold cord. It really worked, she thought gratefully as she shoved it back into her purse. “Were those the French guys who are after you?”

“I think so. With those sunglasses and hats, though, I can’t be certain.”

“How’d they know where we were?”

“I guess they must have followed us.” Eli shook his head. “I thought I’d been careful about covering my tracks.”

“What should we do?”

“Go to the police.”

“Do you think they’ll believe us?”

“I’m sure they’ll believe us. New Orleans has the highest crime rate in the country,” he said. “Catching those assholes is another matter entirely.”

Miranda dug out her cell phone and dialed 911. “Two men just assaulted me and my friend in Jackson Square…No, we aren’t hurt…We’re on Rue de Royale…” She looked around for a street number or some other identification. An old-fashioned coach lamp burned above a sign on a brick building at one end of the courtyard. “I think we’re in the Garden of Eden.”

She hung up and took Eli’s hand. “They’re sending a patrol car to take us to the station so we can make a statement. It might be a while, though. The dispatcher said they’re pretty busy tonight.”

“The Garden of Eden?”

“That’s what the sign says.” She pointed at the brick building.

“I wonder if this is the Tree of Knowledge?” He indicated a nearby tree replete with fragrant white flowers. In the light from the coach lamp, they could make out a number of other trees like it growing in the courtyard.

Miranda sniffed a blossom. “They smell divine.”

A door opened in the brick building and a woman wearing a bibbed apron over a long blue dress stepped out. At her side, she cradled a shotgun.

“Who’s there?” she called.

“Come out of the shadows and show yourselves,” the woman ordered. “Hold your hands up, where I can see them.”

Miranda and Eli obeyed.

The woman trained the shotgun on them. “What do you want?”

“Two men attacked us,” Miranda answered, trying to keep her voice from shaking. “We ran away, and when we saw your open gate, we hid in here.”

Eli added, “We called the police. They should be here any minute.”

“Don’t count on it,” the woman said. “Who are you?”

Miranda introduced herself and Eli. “We’re just tourists on vacation. I’m from Massachusetts and he’s from California.”

“Can we put our hands down?” Eli asked. “We’re not armed or dangerous.”

The woman considered it a moment, then nodded, but kept her weapon ready.

Miranda’s fear shifted to indignation. “Your sign says this is the Garden of Eden.

Shouldn’t it be a peaceful haven? We’re seeking sanctuary, not more violence.”

“Come over here.” The woman motioned with the shotgun, indicating the door to the brick building. “Go inside.”

They crossed the courtyard warily and entered the building, followed by the woman brandishing the shotgun. It looks like some kind of laboratory, Miranda thought, glancing around the large, brightly lit room. An intoxicating, floral scent filled the space.

It smelled like the trees outside, only stronger. A stainless steel table held several glass beakers partly filled with simmering water, perched on metal stands above primitive burners. A wad of muslin was stuffed into the neck of each beaker. Bent tubes ran from the beakers into copper vats. Along one wall stood shelves laden with brown bottles.

“What are you making?” Miranda asked.

“Perfume.”

In the light, she appeared to be only in her early twenties, with porcelain-like skin and delicate features. Her long blond curls were tied back with a blue ribbon that matched her eyes. Miranda almost laughed at the odd juxtaposition. An angel with a shotgun.

The woman reached into one of the vats and withdrew a test tube. She studied it, then returned it to the vat and moved on to the next. When she’d finished checking all the vats, she looked at Miranda.

“Do you like the scent?”

“It’s exquisite. What is it?”

“Jasmine. Made with flowers from the trees in the courtyard.” She pointed to one of the beakers. “The cloth contains loose petals. Steam passes through the cloth, down the delivery tube, and into the test tube. Ice water in the copper vessel chills the steam and condenses it to extract the essential oil.”

The woman moved to another table on which several brown glass bottles, three cobalt-blue bottles, and a fifth of vodka were arrayed. A measuring cup and funnel sat nearby.

“If I put my gun down, will you promise to behave yourselves?” she asked. “I have work to do.”

“We never had any intention of misbehaving,” Eli assured her.

She laid the weapon on the table, close enough to grab if the need arose. “I’ve been robbed a dozen times since Katrina. The police never do a damned thing about it.”

“What should I call you?” Miranda asked, trying to establish a connection. She remembered reading that it was harder for someone to kill you if they felt a personal link with you.

“Nadine.”

“Well, Nadine, I’d like to know more about making perfume.”

Nadine sat on a wooden stool and picked up the vodka bottle. “I’d offer you a drink, but I need this for the perfume.”

She poured two ounces of alcohol in the measuring cup, uncapped a brown bottle, and stuck a funnel in its mouth. Then she trickled the vodka into the funnel. Moving the funnel to the next bottle, she repeated the procedure. When she’d transferred all the alcohol to the brown bottles, she opened one of the blue bottles.

Miranda leaned her elbows on the table and watched, curiosity replacing her apprehension. “What’s that?”

“Jasmine oil.”

Nadine pinched the eyedropper cap and counted out twenty-five drops into one of the brown bottles. She added twenty-five drops to the next bottle, and the next, until she’d infused each one. When she’d finished, she opened a second blue bottle.

“This is essential oil of ginger,” she explained as she dripped a tiny bit of liquid into each of the brown bottles. “Its crispness complements the sweet jasmine.”

She unscrewed the cap of the third blue bottle and squeezed a few drops into each brown bottle.

“What are you adding now?” Miranda asked.

“My secret ingredient.” Nadine smiled. “Most of my concoctions contain a blend of at least three oils. When you first dab one on, you notice the perfume’s top note. Just as it starts to fade, the middle note kicks in. After that’s run its course, what remains is the base note. Making perfume is all about creating a perfect balance of scents. It’s a very delicate process.”

“May I try some?” Miranda asked.

“Oh no. It has to age a while, to allow the scents to ripen.” Nadine capped the brown bottles and shook each one to blend the ingredients. “You need patience—you can’t rush the process.”

“Sounds like winemaking,” Eli said.

“I guess it is.” She glanced from him to Miranda, as if assessing them and their relationship. “Over time, the ingredients mingle and bring out the best in each other. It’s like what happens in a good partnership—the scents marry.”

After sticking labels on the bottles, Nadine collected them on a tray and carried them over to arrange on the shelves. “Perfume makers consider some scents masculine and some feminine. Sharp, spicy scents—like the ginger I used—are masculine. Sweet florals—like jasmine—are feminine. To produce a harmonious blend, you need both.”

Like love, Miranda mused.

A loud knock interrupted them. Nadine picked up the shotgun and went to the door. She put her eye to the peephole, then unlocked the door and opened it. A jowly, middle-aged policeman with café-au-lait skin and a sprinkling of rusty freckles across his 137

broad nose ambled into the lab. His leisurely gait and air of disinterest implied he was simply putting in his time until retirement.

Eyeing Nadine’s weapon, he said, “Mind putting that down, ma’am?”

She laid it on the table and stepped back.

“Y’all called about an attack?”

“We did,” Eli said. “Two men assaulted us in Jackson Square.”

The cop studied each of them in turn. “Anybody hurt?”

Miranda shook her head. “No, we’re fine.”

“I’ll give y’all a ride to the station. You’ll have to fill out some paperwork.”

Eli took Miranda’s arm. “Okay.”

Miranda turned to Nadine. “I enjoyed learning about your perfume.”

“Here, try this.” She handed a small, dark green bottle to Miranda. “I hope you like it.”

“Thanks, I’m sure I will.” Miranda read the label: Eve’s Sin. “Oh my.”

Nadine laughed. “Go easy. That potion’s potent.”

They took a cab from the police station back to the B&B and checked out.

“I wanted to stay in New Orleans another day or two,” Miranda complained as they drove away from the city.

“It’s too dangerous,” Eli said. “The cops aren’t going to find those guys. They’re still on the loose, looking for us.”

“How can you be sure? You said yourself you couldn’t positively identify them.

Maybe they were just ordinary thieves trying to rob us.”

“Maybe. But I can’t put you at risk. In fact, it might be better for us to separate in the morning, for safety’s sake.”

“You’re abandoning me?”

“I’m not abandoning you. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I’ve traveled thousands of miles by myself, escaped bad guys and a flash flood.

I’m not some helpless female.” Besides, there are still about a dozen knots in that golden cord.

“You may be as fleet as a cheetah,” he admitted. “Still, I’d never forgive myself if something happened to you because of me. I’m truly sorry I got you involved in this whole mess.”

“Well, now that you’ve dragged me into it, don’t you think you should stick around to protect me?” Miranda argued. “I mean, if you’re really concerned about my safety? Now those guys know who I am, too.”

“Not necessarily. You could simply have been my date for the evening, or somebody I met in a bar. They might not suspect you know anything. Besides, it’s me they’re after. If you’re not with me, I doubt they’ll bother you.”

“What are you going to do now?”

Eli ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “I have no fucking idea.”

About two hours north of the Big Easy, they stopped at a motel just off the highway.

“This looks like one of those places you rent by the hour,” Miranda said.

“It’s certainly not what you’d call posh,” he agreed. “But it’s late and we both need to get some sleep.”

She plunked her suitcase on the floor beside the TV. “I’m going to wash up.”

“Don’t shower.” He pulled her into an embrace and kissed her neck, down along her collarbone, and across the upper part of her breast. “I want to smell your scent.”

Miranda pressed against him, feeling him stiffen. His hand slid under her dress and caressed her bare buttocks. “I intend to finish what we started in the restaurant.”

“I thought you were tired,” she teased.

“Not that tired.”

“Just let me wash my face and brush my teeth.”

She pushed him away and ducked into the bathroom. After undressing and hurrying through her nighttime ablutions, she uncapped the bottle of perfume Nadine had given her. Eve’s Sin . A sensuous blend of jasmine and apple blossoms greeted her nose, laced with something spicy and provocative that she couldn’t identify. She dabbed a couple of drops between her breasts. The fragrant oil felt strangely hot on her skin.

When she emerged from the bathroom, Eli was sitting on the edge of the bed, naked, his cock pointing toward the ceiling in anticipation. He pulled her to him, pressing his lips to her belly.

“You smell delicious,” he murmured, cupping her breasts in his hands.

She eased herself onto the bed beside him, spreading her legs so he could continue his journey down along her delta to the hot spot between her thighs.

“Oh my,” Miranda moaned as he licked her hard nub.

She felt herself softening to receive him, her heartbeat pounding in her cunt. Her juice oozed onto his tongue. “Let me suck you,” she said.

He shifted into sixty-nine position and she slid his cock into her mouth, flicking her tongue around the ridge of the head while she stroked his stiff shaft with her hand. I love the way it pulses and jerks when I do this, she thought, like it has a life independent of the rest of him.

After a few minutes, however, he rolled onto his back and pulled her up to straddle him. Her pussy gloved him in wet heat. She ground her clit against his pubic bone, then eased away slowly, tightening her muscles around him as she rose, again and again, pumping his hard cock with her cunt. Bending over him, she brushed his chest lightly with her nipples. He drew her down and buried his face in her cleavage. As he inhaled her perfume, his cock seemed to swell within her, its length and girth expanding with each thrust. That’s impossible, she thought as he filled her like never before, but damn, it feels good!

Eli’s pace quickened and she followed his lead, riding him harder, faster, shoving his cock deeper and deeper into her, until she felt he might ram it all the way up to her heart. The creation of life itself requires the harmonious blending of male and female, she thought. Then her orgasm rushed through her and thinking gave way to pure sensation .

Her cries carried him over the edge, and he erupted like a geyser inside her.

Almost immediately he fell asleep, but Miranda lay awake for a long time, listening to his contented breathing and the eighteen-wheelers rolling past on the nearby highway. His body stretched alongside hers, his spent cock draped across her thigh. His hand loosely cupped her breast.

What if he leaves in the morning and I never see him again?

“I’m tired of running scared,” Eli explained over a down-home breakfast of biscuits and gravy in the motel’s tacky coffee shop. “I have to go home and face this situation squarely.”

“That’s the first place those French thugs will look for you,” Miranda pointed out.

“Yes, I know. But I can’t hide out forever. Apparently, I haven’t been very good at hiding anyway. If they found me in New Orleans, they’ll find me again someplace else.

I might as well go back to Meditrina, where at least I’ll have a better chance of solving this mystery.”

“What about me?”

“You still have your trip to finish.”

“I was hoping you’d come with me. It’s more fun sharing the journey with someone.” She stopped short of saying, someone you care about.

“I don’t have that luxury.” He fiddled with the salt and pepper shakers, arranging and rearranging them on the Formica tabletop. “Besides, you’ll be safer without me.

We’ve already discussed this, Miranda.”

She sighed her displeasure. “So you’ll just go back to Napa and wait for someone to attack you again?”

“My plan is to go back to work while I continue investigating the Mort Jaune problem. With any luck, I’ll figure out who did it and make sure they get what they deserve. If those French guys come after me again, I guess I’ll do what I have to do when it happens.”

Miranda signaled the waitress to bring more coffee. Eli sipped his slowly, seeming to turn over possibilities in his head. “Can you take me to the airport in Jackson?”

“I could,” she said. “But I’m thinking of kidnapping you instead.”

He smiled and took her hand. “I don’t know what the future holds, but hopefully we’ll see each other again before long. If that’s what you want, of course.”

“It is.” She smiled back, trying to hide her disappointment.

“We’ll stay in touch. I’ll keep you posted on what develops and you can tell me all about your trip.”

We’ve been apart before, she reminded herself. If he’s really my future husband, everything’s already been decided anyway. This separation is only temporary.

“Find the bad guys fast,” she said.

“I’ll do my best. When it’s all over, maybe you can come to Napa.”

“Or you can come to Salem.”

“Or we could do both.”

While Eli sat at the airport gate waiting to board his plane, his cell phone rang.

The screen displayed Giselle Constant’s name and number.

“Hey there,” she greeted him cheerfully. “How’s everything?”

“Hi, Giselle. Okay, I guess. I’m on my way back to Napa.”

“Really? I thought you’d left Napa because it was too dangerous.”

“Well, it turns out danger lurks in other places, too.” He told her about the men who’d tried to nab him in New Orleans. “Guess I’m not very good at hiding.”

“Cute guys can’t hide. That’s why CIA agents are nondescript.”

Eli chuckled. “So what are you up to?”

“Coincidentally, I’m heading to Napa myself soon.” Her voice dropped to a throaty whisper, rich with possibilities. “Maybe we can hook up while I’m there.”

Memories of their nights together at Fortuna Vineyards played in his mind like an X-rated movie. Heat flared in his groin. “Sounds good to me. Let’s plan on it.”

“Definitely. I’ll call and let you know when to expect me.”

“Okay, great.”

“Don’t get yourself killed before I arrive,” she teased.

“I have no intention of getting killed before or after you arrive. Say hi to Coyote for me.”

“I will. Say hi to Troy for me.”

“Sure. Thanks for calling, Giselle. I’m looking forward to seeing you.”

“And I’m looking forward to seeing you,” she said in a low growl. “Every inch of you.”

By the time he clicked off, Eli was halfway hard. He wondered what Miranda would do if she knew about Giselle. We don’t have any kind of agreement between us, he told himself. I’m free to do whatever and whomever I please.

An attendant announced his flight. Eli picked up his backpack and held it in front of him to conceal the swelling in his jeans. He tried to push thoughts of Giselle out of his head for the moment. This isn’t the time or place to get horny.

He found his seat and stowed his backpack. As he buckled up and pretended to listen to the flight attendant’s air safety speech, he contemplated his relationship with Miranda. I guess if we don’t have a commitment, she can do anything she likes, too. He imagined her in bed with another man, envisioned that man fondling her gorgeous breasts, eating her pussy, fucking her until she moaned with pleasure. He didn’t like the idea at all.

Eli rarely felt jealous. If a woman wasn’t available or preferred somebody else, he could always find plenty more to pick from. He’d never had to look far for female companionship. Like a bee flitting from flower to flower, he drank his fill and moved on.

For some reason, Miranda’s different. What am I going to do about her?

After dropping Eli at the airport, Miranda drove north through Mississippi.

This has to be the most boring state I’ve seen yet, she thought. I wish Eli were here to make the drive more fun. Western Tennessee held little appeal either.

If I liked country music, I might consider heading over to Nashville, but I can easily pass on The Grand Ole Opry. I think I’ll skip Graceland, too.

She spent the night near the intersection of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, and in the morning followed the Ohio east, hoping to find someplace that piqued her interest.

Finally she acknowledged that she wasn’t bored; she was lonely. When she delved a little deeper, she discovered sadness and apprehension just below the surface. What if Eli eases back into his old life in Napa and forgets all about me? Or worse, what if those French guys get him? He might not be so lucky next time.

A sign for Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area caught her eye.

Maybe communing with nature will improve my mood. She turned south and soon came to the inland peninsula sandwiched between Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley. After renting a cabin for the night and picking up a site map at the visitors’ center, she set out to explore as much of the park’s 170,000 acres as possible.

First she drove through a grassy prairie where bison and long-horned elk roamed freely, much as they had before white men settled Kentucky. Next she hiked along one of the park’s less strenuous trails, part of an intricate network that crisscrossed the peninsula. Herons, egrets, Canadian geese, and other waterfowl populated the marshes.

Deer grazed along the shores. A pair of otters cavorted in a stream.

She recalled what Freeman had told her over tea in his tree house near the Atchafalaya swamp: “When an animal or bird appears to us, it could be bringing a message.” Everywhere she looked ,she saw wildlife of one sort or another. Surely they couldn’t all be messengers, could they? And if they were, how could she possibly decipher their language? Maybe they showed her the way to simply be, to live in the moment, trusting her instincts to guide and provide for her, instead of worrying about the future or analyzing the past. A hawk soaring overhead reminded her of the magician Lancelot Lucas.

What a strange assortment of people I’ve met on this journey.

In the afternoon, Miranda decided to join a trail ride. It sounded like a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours, but once she’d mounted the palomino gelding, she had second thoughts. I haven’t ridden a horse since high school. I hope I can keep from falling off. She gripped the reins with sweaty hands. I’ve heard horses can sense your fear.

As the group of horses and riders loped along the peaceful waterfront, she began to relax. The sun warmed her back and made the green lake sparkle like an emerald. To the west stretched rolling hills dappled with wildflowers.

They’d nearly reached an old iron furnace, abandoned now for more than a century, when she saw the snake coiled at the side of the trail. Her horse stopped short, reared, and bolted. Miranda let out a startled shriek and gripped the saddle horn, clenching the gelding’s sides with her legs. She yanked on the reins, but the horse kept running. Panic surged in her chest.

With her heart pounding hard and fast like the horse’s hooves, she suddenly recalled an incident years ago when a riptide swept her away while swimming in the icy waters off the Maine coast. Struggling against the powerful current only made things worse. When she relaxed, however, the ocean carried her back to shore. Go with the flow, don’t fight, a voice inside her advised. Miranda leaned forward, close to the palomino’s neck, and gave him his head. If I can just hang on, I’ll be okay. They galloped another half-mile before the horse seemed to decide he was out of harm’s way and slowed down.

The trail ride’s leader cantered up beside her. “Are you all right?”

Miranda nodded, trying to catch her breath. Her heart hammered against her ribcage.

“What happened?” he asked.

“A snake… spooked him.”

He took the gelding’s reins from her, and led horse and rider back to the group. At the end of the trail Miranda slid down from the palomino, glad to be standing on firm ground again. Her legs felt sore and shaky. Her butt ached from bumping on the saddle.

A man with very broad shoulders and very narrow hips strolled over to her, his movements so fluid he seemed to be made of water. “You okay?” he asked. His Tennessee twang reminded her of a banjo. “That was quite a ride.”

“Seems like everything’s still in place,” she answered.

He looked her up and down, with deliberate slowness. “Seems like that to me, too.” He grinned, revealing a row of sparkling white teeth broken by a single, gold incisor. “Where you headed now?”

“Back to my cabin to relax.”

“You stayin’ at the Wranglers’ Camp?”

She nodded.

“Mind if I walk with you?”

He told her his name was Jeremy and that he was a professional bull rider.

Ordinarily, Miranda might’ve been intrigued and shown more enthusiasm, plying him with questions about his rodeo adventures. But as they walked toward the camp, her attention kept wandering.

“I got a couple steaks an’ some beer,” he said when they reached her cabin. “How ’bout sharing ’em with me t’night?”

“Thanks, but I’m pretty tired. I think I’ll pass.”

He looked disappointed, but not convinced. “Maybe once you get washed up and rested a bit, you’ll change your mind. If you do, my RV’s over there, the one with the flames painted on it.” He pointed toward a camping area. “Just gimme a holler.”

After a hot shower, Miranda felt better. Briefly she contemplated accepting Jeremy’s offer, but her heart wasn’t in it—and neither was the rest of her. She wished Eli were here. She tried his cell phone, but got his voice mail.

Sipping a Coke she’d bought from a vending machine, she stretched out on the bed, replaying erotic images of the two of them together on her mental monitor. What’s wrong with you, girl? You’re acting like a lovesick teenager, she chastised herself.

She got up and pulled a paperback novel from one of the pockets in her suitcase.

As she did, the crystal she’d found in Uncle Bright’s field fell out. Its planes and points sparkled when she picked it up, inviting her to look deeper. Holding it in her hand, she remembered the scenario she’d seen inside the crystal, more than a week before the attack in New Orleans occurred. I glimpsed the future once before. Can I do it again?

She rubbed the crystal between her palms like Aladdin’s lamp, and took a deep breath. Letting her gaze follow its pattern of wisps and flecks, she noticed shapes slowly forming inside.

A sunny day. Rows and rows of green-gold vines, laden with purple fruit. Eli, wearing a white T-shirt and faded jeans, plucked a grape from one of the vines. Miranda smiled, watching him. He looked happy. Then a pretty, petite woman with black curls approached Eli. She opened her mouth and he fed her the grape. The woman sucked his fingers suggestively, stepping closer…

A sharp pain stabbed Miranda just below her left breast and ran through her body, like a hot sword. A dark, murky fear bubbled up within her, the same feeling she’d experienced when she’d previewed the scene in New Orleans’ Jackson Square. The word danger flashed in her mind, before the image in the crystal vanished.

“You son of a bitch!” she swore. “Is that why you went back to Napa?”

Miranda’s blue eyes filled with tears as she tucked the crystal back into her suitcase. I thought we had something special. I thought you really cared about me. I thought one day you’d be my husband. She fingered the Navaho silver bracelet on her wrist.

“How dare you lead me on like that!” She glowered at the mirror, as she rouged her cheeks and brushed on mascara. “If you think you can make a fool of me, Eli Hart, you’re dead wrong!”

She swiped lipstick on her full lips, unbuttoned the top three buttons of her blouse, and opened the cabin door. Tossing her purple-streaked hair, she strode defiantly toward the RV with the flames on its side.

Standing before Edward Hopper’s famous painting, Nighthawks, Miranda studied the couple seated at the counter of the eerie, brightly lit diner. Had they stopped for a cup of coffee after a night out on the town before going home to their bungalow in Brooklyn?

Or was the woman in the red dress a prostitute, the man beside her a john? And what about the lone man, whose face she couldn’t see? All three seemed lost in their own thoughts, allowing her to observe them, but not inviting her into their isolated world.

“Miranda?” A voice stirred her from her contemplation.

She turned to see a man with salt-and-pepper hair, a neatly trimmed beard, and eyes like smoldering coals. “Zeke Parelli?”

“What are you doing in Chicago?” he asked. He gave her a quick hug, pressing her cheek against his Egyptian cotton shirt.

“I’m touring the country, something I’ve wanted to do since before Dad got sick,” she answered, gazing up at him. He must be sixty, but he’s still damned good-looking.

Until she was six years old, her father and Zeke Parelli traveled the East Coast, performing in bars and restaurants, at weddings, corporate functions, and private parties—anyplace that would hire them. Most of the time they sang soft rock classics, Danny Malone’s clear Irish tenor backed up by Zeke’s rich baritone. After a bit too much to drink, however, they crooned old ballads with heartbreaking beauty.

When Zeke sang at her father’s wake, men and women cried openly. Miranda remembered sitting on his knee that evening, Zeke wiping her tears with his handkerchief while he told her stories of the duo’s days on the road, their youthful dreams of stardom.

Dreams that ended when Danny Malone took a job at the GE plant in Lynn, Massachusetts, to support his family and Zeke Parelli became a lawyer with a cadre of questionable clients.

“Lucky I ran into you,” he said. “Why didn’t you’d let me know you were coming to Chicago? I would have arranged to take time off to show you around.”

“It was an impromptu decision. I didn’t know myself that I was coming until two days ago,” she explained.

“At least let me take you to dinner. Are you free tonight?”

Miranda nodded. “I’d like that. Thanks.”

She told him the name of her hotel and Zeke promised to pick her up at seven.

“Wear something pretty,” he said with a smile that held implications she couldn’t quite decipher.

Located in a beautifully restored Victorian brownstone, the Chicago Chop House resonated with the city’s colorful past, when meatpackers, politicians, and gangsters vied for control of the Windy City. The entire staff appeared to know Zeke Parelli and greeted him with deferential smiles.

“This restaurant serves steaks almost as big as you,” Zeke teased Miranda.

He ordered martinis for them both and a bottle of Chilean Cabernet for dinner.

What would Eli think about that? she mused. She hadn’t spoken with him since viewing the vineyard scene in her crystal; he’d left a message on her voice mail yesterday, but she hadn’t returned the call. Let him wonder what I’m up to, while he’s fooling around with his little grape-sucking bitch.

Scanning the appetizers, she noticed cherrystone clams and flashed back to their risqué act in the New Orleans restaurant. The memory triggered sparks between her legs.

I’ll never again eat clams without thinking of him. Under “Desserts,” she spotted an item named Eli’s Cheesecake. Dammit, I can’t seem to get away from the boy.

She slapped the menu closed. “I’ll have smoked salmon to start, followed by spring lamb chops.”

After giving their order to the waiter, Zeke checked his cell phone. “Sorry, I have to make a call.” Ten minutes later, he returned and asked her a few questions about her trip, before excusing himself again. “Sometimes it seems like I’m bound to this phone,” he said.

“Can’t it wait until after dinner?”

Zeke shook his head. “These aren’t guys you keep waiting.”

Twice more during the meal, Zeke left the table to converse with guys who didn’t like to wait. While he was gone, she checked her own messages for word from Eli.

Nothing. Miranda sipped her wine, imagining all sorts of things that could be keeping him busy, none of which eased her mind. The petite woman with the black curls popped up annoyingly in every scenario.

The waiter approached and handed her a long-stemmed red rose. “Mr. Parelli asked me to bring you this with his apologies for not being more attentive to such a lovely lady.”

She sniffed its lush fragrance. Then she ordered dessert, drank some more wine, and forgave Zeke’s frequent absences. For all his wealth, he’s not a free man. I’d hate to be a slave to his masters.

“Let’s go back to my place for a nightcap,” Zeke said. “I have a terrific view I’d like to show you. No more phone calls, I promise.”

You’ve already had enough to drink, the voice of reason warned. But Miranda heard her own voice say, “Okay.”

They rode the elevator to the sixteenth floor of a building on Lake Shore Drive.

Zeke opened the door to his condo and ushered her inside. Entering his living room, she felt as if she were floating on air, suspended in a bubble high above the metropolis. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked Lake Michigan, the lights of the city reflecting off its dark surface.

“Make yourself at home,” he said, as she stepped into an area the size of a basketball court, furnished with Italian leather sofas and Persian rugs.

While Zeke busied himself in the kitchen, she gazed into the distance and tried not to think about what a person had to do to afford such a luxurious lifestyle. She inspected the artwork hanging on the condo’s walls, large garish paintings full of energy, but lacking cohesion or depth. Somewhere an angry young man was spewing his guts onto canvases and convincing people like Zeke, with more money than taste, to invest in the next Van Gogh.

“What do think?” Zeke asked. He handed her a glass of amber liquor that smelled like a sweet, warm summer’s day.

Not wanting to comment on his choice of art, she said, “The view is spectacular.”

He clinked his glass to hers. “So are you.”

She noticed his gaze drift to her cleavage and wondered if maybe she should’ve worn something less revealing for an evening out with her father’s old friend. But the alcohol had melted her reserve, letting old feelings bubble to the surface.

As a little girl, she’d adored Zeke. She remembered dancing with him in her parents’ kitchen, Zeke swinging her high in the air and whisking her around the room until she was dizzy with delight. She recalled the long-haired waifs with their love beads and gypsy skirts who’d fawned after him during his musician days, and how she’d wished he’d look at her the way he looked at them. Well now, that’s exactly what he was doing.

Miranda threw back her head and thrust her chest toward him. Zeke buried his face between her breasts. He set his drink down and slid his hands under her dress, gripping her butt with his strong fingers. With his teeth, he undid the buttons of her bodice one by one. She marveled at his dental dexterity, heat rising from her core as each button gave way to his mouth. How does he do that?

He slid her dress down over her shoulders, revealing her full breasts beautifully displayed in a satin push-up bra. His appreciative gaze made her whole body tingle.

“Who’d have guessed Danny’s little girl would grow up to be such a ravishing woman?” he sighed, running his hands over her smooth skin.

His cock strained against his linen trousers, begging for release. Miranda ran her fingertips up and down it, lightly stroking him through the fine fabric, while his fingers tweaked her taut nipples.

With a lusty laugh, Zeke swept her up in his arms and carried her into his bedroom. Dozens of tiny lights winked like stars in the ceiling. He slowly undressed her, then laid her down on his brass king-size bed. As he removed his own clothing, he hummed Bob Dylan’s song, Lay, Lady, Lay.

Sitting beside her on the bed, he stretched her arms above her head and held her wrists, while he leisurely stroked her breasts and belly with his other hand. Ripples of desire slithered up and down Miranda’s body.

“Now, my dear,” he said, letting his eyes caress her along with his fingers, “I’m going to make up for being so inattentive to you earlier this evening.”

From beneath a pillow, Zeke withdrew a long, red silk scarf. He trailed it up and down her body; the sensuous fabric’s light touch tantalized her like hot breath. She opened her legs so he could brush her pussy with it. As she sighed with pleasure, he looped the scarf around her wrists. Before she had time to react, he tied the other end to the bedpost.

“What…?” she started to protest.

Zeke silenced her with a long, slow, mesmerizing kiss. His fingers slid gently along her seam until she arched toward his hand, moaning for more.

“Relax, dear Miranda.”

His lips and tongue meandered down her neck, shoulders, breasts, and belly. His beard tickled delightfully. Intentionally avoiding her pussy, he continued kissing her thighs, calves, and feet. When he’d finished sucking each toe, he turned her over and began the journey in reverse, up her backside. By the time he reached the nape of her neck, Miranda was mewing like a cat and rubbing her pussy against the silk sheets.

She heard the nightstand drawer open, then the buzz of a vibrator. Zeke ran the pulsing toy over her shoulders and back, to her firm, round butt. He slid it along her crack, just long enough to make her gasp with pleasure, before rolling it down the inside of one leg and up the other. Flipping her over on her back again, he stroked her breasts with the vibe, teasing one nipple then the other. She giggled as he tickled her stomach and cried out when he touched the quivering tip to her clit for a second.

“Please… don’t stop…” she begged when he withdrew the vibe from her pleasure point.

“Oh, I don’t intend to stop,” he said, and chuckled. “I’m just getting started.”

For the next hour, Zeke caressed her body with his hands, lips, beard, cock, a fur mitten, a rough piece of nubby raw silk, and the vibrator, bringing her almost to her peak again and again without letting her come. Each time she teetered on the edge, he stopped his delicious torture until her passion receded. Then he began anew.

He grinned at her. “Women always complain they don’t get enough foreplay.”

Tears ran down Miranda’s cheeks. Her juice leaked onto the sheet. Fire raged through her body, threatening to consume her. Delirious with desire, she gasped, sighed, shuttered, moaned, and pleaded with him.

“Damnit, Zeke, just fuck me,” she demanded finally, squirming beneath his touch.

“I can’t bear it any longer.”

“Surrender, my dear. If you don’t stop thrashing about, I’ll have to tie your ankles, too.” He slapped her pussy lightly several times. “Now be a good girl.”

A shriek ripped through the bedroom. Zeke frowned, listened for a moment, then jumped up from the bed. He grabbed a bathrobe from the closet and threw it on as he dashed out.

“What the hell?” Miranda yelled after him.

The shrieking intensified.

“Zeke!”

Tugging at the scarf that bound her to the bedpost, Miranda struggled vainly to free herself. She tried to untie the knot with her teeth; it refused to budge.

“Shit, shit, shit!”

Zeke burst back into the bedroom. “The building’s on fire. We have to evacuate.”

He hurried into the bathroom and returned with a pair of nail scissors. “Get dressed,” he said as he snipped the scarf, freeing her hands.

He threw on his own clothes, and snatched up his laptop and briefcase.

Miranda could smell smoke as they rushed down the hall, along with other frightened residents. Zeke dragged her toward an EXIT sign. “We have to take the stairs.”

In the stairwell, the smoke was thicker. He passed her a handkerchief to cover her nose and mouth as they raced down the steps. Twice she tripped, twisting her ankle. As they descended, more and more people poured into the stairwell. Finally they reached the lobby, where pandemonium reigned, and shoved their way through the crowd to the street.

A few blocks from the burning building, Zeke hailed a cab for her.

“Talk about coitus interruptus,” she bitched, as he paid the driver to take her to her hotel.

Miranda was the last to arrive at Heidi’s parents’ vacation home on Lake Michigan. Every summer since college, the four friends had converged here for a long weekend of excessive eating, drinking, and general indulgence while catching up on each other’s lives. Last year, however, Miranda had missed their annual reunion because of her father’s illness.

As she carried her suitcase to the yellow cottage with dark green shutters, Heidi, Kate, and Isadora—whom everyone called Izzy—hailed her from the porch. Izzy waved a half-empty bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.

“We thought you got lost.” Heidi jumped up to hug Miranda. She looked exactly like someone named Heidi should: plump, blond, blue-eyed, and rosy-cheeked, with a wide grin and generous manner.

“I got a late start,” Miranda explained. “Last night was beyond belief.”

Kate laughed and hugged her next. “I can’t wait to hear about it.” Half a head shorter than Miranda and delicate as a bird, Kate’s pixie haircut and sprinkling of freckles made her look like a ten-year-old girl instead of the insurance executive she was.

“I like the purple streaks,” Izzy said, tugging a lock of Miranda’s hair. Her own hair blazed poppy-red and hung nearly to her pencil-thin waist. In her turquoise bikini, she appeared to have lost at least twenty pounds since the last time Miranda saw her.

“Look at you. You’re as skinny as a fashion model,” Miranda said.

Izzy shrugged. “Too much stress, the divorce and all. Plus I started smoking again.”

“We’re going to fatten her up this weekend,” Heidi promised. She pulled up a wicker chair for Miranda and the four women settled themselves on the porch overlooking the lake, feet propped on the railing.

Izzy poured a glass of wine for Miranda. “You’ve got some catching up to do—we’re way ahead of you.”

“So what else have I missed?” Miranda asked.

“Oh, lots,” Kate said. “We’re swapping stories of our recent fucks.”

“Heidi was telling us about her highland fling with a Scottish bagpipe player when you drove up,” Izzy said, lighting a cigarette.

“Start back at the beginning,” Miranda insisted. “I want to hear everything.”

“It was a dark and foggy night,” Heidi began in a dramatic tone. “Unseasonably warm for March in Scotland. I’d just met this guy who played bagpipes. Handsome bearded chap. Wore a kilt and everything.” She paused to drink some wine before continuing. “Anyway, we had dinner together and during the course of our conversation, I mentioned an old castle perched high on a bluff above the ocean. I’d seen it from the road and asked him about it. He offered to give me a private guided tour. We hiked around the grounds in the moonlight, overgrown gardens with naked statues and fountains and such. Did I mention there was a full moon? The castle was kind of dilapidated, obviously vacant a long time, but still beautiful and eerie with the fog drifting in off the ocean. I could hear the waves breaking on the shore below, and the sound of a foghorn in the distance. It was so damned romantic.”

“And you couldn’t restrain yourself. You simply had to find out whether it’s true what they say about men in kilts not wearing knickers,” Izzy teased.

Heidi giggled. “When we started across an old wooden bridge over a moat, I reached under his kilt and…”

“And what?” Miranda prompted.

“No knickers!”

The four women laughed and clinked their wine glasses together.

“We did it right there on the bridge,” Heidi said. “Afterwards, I had about a zillion splinters in my butt. He had to pull them out, one by one, with tweezers.”

“It was worth it though, right?” Kate asked.

“Oh, yes. Definitely. But here’s the best part—he blew me with the bagpipes.”

Izzy ground out her cigarette. “This I’ve got to hear.”

“He held one of the pipes between my legs and played this lively jig. Let me tell you girls, the air coming out of that pipe, the music and the vibration, and knowing his hot breath made it all happen, well, it was the most amazing sex toy.”

“Oh my God,” Miranda howled, and her companions joined in.

Izzy topped off their glasses, emptying the bottle. “That’s the end of this one.

Fortunately, there’s plenty more where this came from.” She went inside and returned with a full bottle, plus a jar of cashews and a bag of potato chips.

“You’re next, Izzy,” Heidi prompted. “What’s it like being a free woman again after years of married life?”

“Well… I did my first three-way. Sort of.”

“Sort of?” Kate asked.

“There’s this guy in my office I’ve always been hot for, so now that Paul’s history, I invited him over for a drink. One thing led to another…”

“It usually does,” Kate said.

“We’re just getting into it when his cell phone rings and he answers it. I’m thinking you asshole when he says it’s his best friend and suggests we let him in on the action. He hands me the phone and says, ‘Here, you talk to him.’ So his friend starts talking dirty to me and, well, I kinda liked it. It was fun having one guy doing me and another one talking me off.”

Miranda grabbed a handful of nuts. “I guess that counts as a two-fer.”

“I took pictures of us with the phone, too, so his friend could see us.”

“No way!” Heidi shrieked, laughing.

“Yeah, really,” Izzy admitted.

“Makes me think maybe getting divorced isn’t such a bad thing,” Kate said.

Izzy shook her head. “Trust me, it is. Divorce sucks big time.”

Kate squeezed Izzy’s hand. “Sorry, Iz. I know you’ve been through hell. But now that it’s over, I hope you have the fun you deserve.”

“Hear, hear,” Miranda said and the women clinked glasses again.

“Miranda, we haven’t heard about your trip yet,” Heidi said. “Of course we’ll expect a full report before the weekend’s out, but right now, inquiring minds want to know about the men you’ve met along the way.”

Watching the sun sink into the lake, Miranda considered where to begin. “There’s so much to tell, this could be a whole book.”

“We’re all ears,” Izzy said. “How about starting with last night?”

“Okay. I don’t think any of you’ve ever met him, but you remember me telling you about my dad’s old friend, Zeke? The one who used to be a musician and now is a lawyer for mobsters in Chicago?”

“You did Zeke?” Heidi asked, her blue eyes wide with surprise.

“Not quite.” Miranda described the extended foreplay session that ended abruptly when the building caught fire.

Izzy fanned herself with her hands. “Whew, you must’ve been generating some kinda heat, girlfriend!”

All four burst into giggles. When they recovered, Kate said, “Speaking of mobsters. I met a guy at a boat show in Los Angeles a few months ago. Handsome, sexy, Italian guy, early forties. Designer suit, diamond ring, Rolex, very bling-bling. We hit it off immediately and I ended up spending the night in his suite at the Biltmore. Great hotel, by the way, if you’ve never been there I highly recommend it.” She took a handful of potato chips and munched them.

“How did you know he’s with the mob?” Heidi asked.

“I’m getting to that,” Kate continued. “A few days later, he called and asked me to meet him in Miami and had a courier deliver a first-class plane ticket to my office. We had a great time. The next week he flew me to New York. He lavished me with expensive gifts, jewelry, a mink jacket, all probably hot. I met him in Philly a week later, but he was in a hurry so we just got it on in his limo in the airport parking lot. He gave me a pair of handmade Italian lizard pumps and wanted me to wear them while we fucked. He even licked the shoes.”

“Oh my God,” Miranda laughed.

“This went on until about a month ago when I met him in Atlanta. He gave me a fabulous emerald necklace, then handed me a suitcase full of money he wanted me to launder for him.”

“Katie, you didn’t!” Heidi exclaimed.

“Of course not. Well, that ended the affair.” She ran a hand though her short, spiky hair and sighed. “Honestly, I’m glad it’s over.”

“Did you keep all the goodies?” Miranda asked.

“Sure did.”

“You’re not worried he’ll try to bump you off or anything, are you?” Heidi asked.

Kate shook her head. “If I informed on him or something, he might get nasty, but I was so fringe I’m not really a threat to him. I never even knew his last name or where he lives. Just Vincent.”

Izzy lit another cigarette and blew smoke rings. “My, my, we’ve certainly been busy little beavers, haven’t we?”

“To us, brazen hussies,” Kate toasted. The four women clinked glasses again and tossed back the last of their wine.

“All this talk is making me hungry,” Heidi said. “Anybody ready for my famous spaghetti and meatballs?”

Over dinner, Miranda regaled her friends with tales of her journey. They insisted on seeing the golden cord she’d knotted with the sex magician, Lancelot Lucas. They high-fived her when she related her night on the riverboat casino with Clint. When she finished telling them about Eli eating her beneath the table in the New Orleans restaurant, they shrieked, “Oh my God!” in unison.

She passed her cell phone around so they could see pictures of Eli, at Sybil’s place in Mendocino, in Santa Fe, in San Antonio, and in New Orleans.

“He’s adorable,” Heidi said.

“A definite hunk,” Izzy agreed. “Look at those abs!”

“What’s he doing now?” Kate asked.

“That’s a good question,” Miranda answered. “I think we need more wine for this part of the story.”

“Let’s take it out to the hot tub,” Heidi suggested.

They cleared the dishes and stacked them in the dishwasher, then walked outside across the dew-damp grass to a hot tub that overlooked the lake. They removed the cover and their clothing and climbed in. When all were seated comfortably at the four corners of the tub, Heidi passed the wine bottle around and they refilled their glasses.

“Okay, Miranda, continue the saga of Eli,” Kate said.

Stars sparkled in the jet-black sky. Like the quartz crystals at Uncle Bright’s place. Miranda gazed up at them, luxuriating in the hot, bubbling water.

“After the French guys attacked us in New Orleans, he decided to go back to work at the vineyard in Napa Valley.”

“Hello,” Izzy interrupted. “He’s like a sitting duck there, am I right?”

“That’s what I told him, but he said he was tired of hiding and they’d find him anyway.” She sipped her wine and thought about the woman with the black curls. “What I suspect is, he’s got a girlfriend there and went back to her.”

“What makes you think that?” Heidi asked. “It sounds like he’s so into you.”

Miranda explained how she’d seen Eli and the other woman in the crystal, and how she’d experienced the same sense of fear and foreboding she’d felt upon viewing the scene of the horse-drawn carriages at Jackson Square.

“I haven’t talked to him since he got back to Napa, a week ago. He left a message that he’d arrived safely and another saying he was working at the vineyard again, but that’s all. Nothing romantic, nothing dirty even.”

“Oh, look.” Kate pointed at the sky. “A shooting star.”

“Cool. Make a wish, everybody,” Heidi said. “I wish for a trip to the Caribbean.”

“I wish Paul’s girlfriend would leave him and break his cheating heart,” Izzy said bitterly.

Kate wished for a promotion. “I want my boss’s job. He’s a totally incompetent jerk.”

“I wish Eli would leave Napa and move to Salem with me.” Wow, did I actually say that? I wonder if wishing on a star really works.

“There’s another one,” Heidi said as a star blazed through the heavens. “Let’s make wishes for each other this time.”

“I wish Izzy meets Mr. Right and they fall madly in love,” Miranda said.

“Or lust, at least. Thanks,” Izzy said. “I wish Kate gets promoted to president of the company and fires her boss.”

Kate laughed. “Sounds good to me. I wish Heidi buys a beach house on St. John and invites us all down over Christmas.”

“Definitely,” Heidi agreed. “I wish Miranda and Eli have a big wedding and we’re all bridesmaids.”

They put their toes together in the middle of the hot tub and lifted their legs out of the water, forming a pyramid. Kate started singing, “When you wish upon a star…” and they all chimed in at the finish “…your dreams come true.”

“I bet Troy was surprised to see you,” Eli said to Giselle as they strolled between rows of Meditrina’s grapevines heavy with purple fruit. The California sun warmed his shoulders. The smell of the soil, the vines, the ripening grapes enticed his nostrils. It’s good to be home, he thought.

“I called ahead of time,” she said. “I wouldn’t just pop in on him unannounced. I don’t like surprises.”

“Did your visit go okay?”

Giselle eyed him curiously. “Of course. Why wouldn’t it?”

“I guess I thought there was some, uh, animosity between you two.” Eli noticed a yellowing leaf and stopped to inspect it. Just a little dryness. I’m really getting paranoid.

“Between his wife and me, yeah. But Troy and I have always gotten along.”

He plucked a grape and held it to her mouth. Giselle opened her full lips and he slipped the grape between them. She sucked his fingers. A twinge of desire flared in his groin as he imagined her sucking his dick.

“Do you still have a thing for him?” he asked.

“Getting involved with a married man is a prescription for heartache. I’ve learned my lesson.”

Eli’s cell phone chimed and he snapped it open. Miranda’s name and number appeared on the screen. Bad timing, he thought, shutting the cell. “Sorry, you were saying?”

“Troy’s history. I have better ways to occupy my time now.” She smiled coquettishly at him.

“I’d like to occupy some of that time, if you’re interested. Are you free tonight?”

“I might be. Depends on what you have in mind.”

He touched the tip of her breast, drawing slow circles around her nipple with his finger. “I’d like to cook dinner for you. I make a mean veal marsala.”

Giselle tilted her head to one side and licked her lips. “Sounds delicious.”

“Let me write down my address.” He pulled out his wallet and searched for a business card.

“I know where you live. See you at seven.”

Giselle’s tight red dress left little to his imagination.

I could get lost forever in that cleavage, Eli thought, as she stepped into his apartment. He allowed his eyes to feast on her flesh long enough to convey his intentions. “You look terrific.”

She handed him a bottle of Chardonnay from Fortuna Vineyards. “This is one of our best, in my opinion. I’ll be eager to hear your take on it.”

“Thanks. Can I pour some for you now? Dinner won’t be ready for half an hour.”

“Sure.” She cast her gaze around the apartment, checking it out. “The veal smells great.”

“I’d planned to have a Sangiovese with dinner. Is that okay with you?”

“Perfect.”

He opened the bottle of Chard and filled two glasses. As she took the one he offered, her fingers brushed his. Her touch sent electricity surging up his arm. They clinked glasses.

“To your visit,” he toasted. “Has it really been three years since you left Meditrina?”

“Thirty-nine months, to be exact.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Of course. I mean, Texas is fine, but it’s not Napa.”

He sipped the wine without taking his eyes off her. “This is pretty good. In a few years, you might give us a run for our money.”

“That’s the plan.” She looked up at him through her thick, dark lashes. “Coyote’s been good about sending me to other parts of the world to get ideas for our business. I’ve been to France and Italy a couple of times. Last February I went to Australia—I even met Greg Norman.”

“I’m envious. I’ve always regretted missing that excursion Troy chartered to France a few years back. Sounds like everyone had a hell of a good time.” He shrugged.

“But it coincided with my sister’s wedding—what can you do?”

She nodded. “It was great fun. Laissez les bon temps roulez, as we say in Louisiana.”

He stepped closer to her and pushed her dark curls away from her face, smelling her perfume. It reminded him of the Garden of Eden in New Orleans. “Maybe we can take a trip together one of these days.”

“Maybe.” She kissed him lightly, tracing the outline of his lips with her tongue.

He pulled her into his arms and tried to kiss her harder, but she pushed him away, laughing. “Dinner first.”

“Of course.” He trailed the backs of his fingers along her collarbone and down to her cleavage. “With each bite, I’ll be thinking of how you taste.”

The veal turned out better than he’d expected, and Giselle praised his culinary skills lavishly. With only candlelight illuminating her face, she seemed to glow from within. Her skin shone like the moon, a pale, luminous gold, and her black eyes sparkled.

She ate the last bite and crossed her knife and fork on her plate. “How’s Meditrina’s Morte Jaune problem?”

“I think we’ve got it under control, for the moment at least. But we had to rip up a lot of vines to keep it from spreading.”

“Have you figured out yet how it started?”

Eli shook his head. “It’s not an airborne disease and you can’t just sprinkle it on the ground like rat poison. Someone had to plant infected vines among our healthy ones.”

“Hmm. That seems to rule out tourists tramping through the vineyard with contaminated shoes, doesn’t it?”

“I’d always suspected a competitor wanted to ruin us. That’s why I asked a botany professor at San Francisco State to study the disease. He compiled a report of all the vineyards in France where the Morte Jaune fungus is known to exist.” He set his plate aside and rested his elbows on the table. “Then someone ransacked my apartment and stole my computer, and those two French guys attacked me in San Francisco. Naturally my suspicion grew.”

“Did the police ever arrest anyone?”

“No, and they never arrested the two guys who tried to get me in New Orleans either.”

“Were they the same men who assaulted you in San Francisco?”

“I really can’t say. It happened so fast, I didn’t get a good look at them.”

Giselle smiled at him. “I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”

“Me too.” He poured the last of the Sangiovese into their glasses. “Morte Jaune can take three or four years to show up, so I went through Meditrina’s files to see when we had visitors from the French vineyards on my ‘diseased’ list. Interestingly, there were only a few during that time frame.”

“Do you have enough info to pin it on one of them?”

“Unfortunately, no. To accuse a competitor I’d have practically had to catch someone digging around in the vineyard in the dark of night.”

She sipped her wine, watching him over the rim of the glass with her dark, luminous eyes. “But it’s certainly possible. I mean, Meditrina isn’t a walled fortress.

Anybody who wanted to could get in and plant diseased vines.”

“I’m also considering the possibility of an inside job,” Eli said. “Whoever did it had to have a motive, as well as means and opportunity. I’ve examined the employee records for the past four years trying to find a logical suspect, but so far I can’t finger anyone. The whole thing’s so damned confusing.”

Giselle leaned across the table, which accentuated her cleavage, and took his hands in hers. “Why don’t we put work behind us for a while?”

The moon shone through the window, spilling its creamy light across Giselle’s full, round breasts with their erect purple tips. Eli sucked one nipple, then the other hungrily.

“Harder,” she moaned beneath him and grabbed his stiff cock. He obliged. As she guided him into her hot, wet slit, he buried his face in her cleavage.

“I want to fuck you ’til you can’t take it anymore, ’til you think you’ve died and gone to heaven,” he said, pumping her body so vigorously he worried that he might hurt her. But she wrapped her legs around his hips, pulling him into her, slamming her mound against his pubic bone.

“Yes… oh, yes…”

Her fingernails dug into his skin. She bit his neck. Placing his hands on her ass, he lifted her pelvis to gain better access. He plunged into her as if she were a fertile field he was plowing with his rod. Again and again he thrust, delving deeper each time.

“Split me in two,” she growled as he rammed his cock in her with a force that brought her to a crashing orgasm. He almost lost it as she ground against him, howling her pleasure.

“Don’t come yet,” she ordered, squeezing the base of his cock.

He eased out of her, gasping. Giselle rolled over and presented her firm, round butt to him. “I want you to fuck me in the ass.”

Not many women he’d known liked it this way. Giselle’s unabashed eagerness revved him into high gear. First he inserted his finger to gently open her. Tight, but yielding. He was already so wet with her fluids that he had no trouble entering.

While he drove into her channel, she fingered her clit, uttering low, animal sounds. His balls slapped her buttocks. Moonlight washed her sweat-glistened back. He grabbed her breasts with both hands, pinching her hard nipples until she cried out, shuddering violently as she came. He couldn’t hold back any longer. Like a fire hose gushing, his cock convulsed, spurting its hot juice as wave after wave of ecstasy washed through him.

She collapsed on her stomach and he lay down on top of her, completely drained, his heart pounding against her back. Moments later he fell asleep.

Sounds coming from the guest room, which also served as his home office, woke Eli. His first thought was, the thieves are back.

He tossed off the sheet and grabbed the baseball bat he kept under the bed. Tiptoeing down the dark hall, he noticed a faint light emanating from his office. Quietly he stepped inside and switched on a lamp.

Giselle stood at his desk, naked, aiming a small flashlight at an open file drawer.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

She snapped the flashlight off and faced him. “Looking for your Morte Jaune report.”

“Why?”

“I’m worried that Fortuna Vineyards might be infected. I need to know what you’ve discovered.”

“That’s funny. When I asked Coyote if you’d had any problems with the fungus, he said no.”

Giselle eyed the Louisville Slugger in his hand. “Shortly after I started working there, we expanded and planted twelve additional acres with Vinifera vines. They came from one of the French vineyards that’s recently admitted to having Morte Jaune. ”

“Coyote knows more about growing grapes than I ever will. If Fortuna’s vines were contaminated, he’d be aware of it.” Eli took a few steps toward her. “I thought your job was coordinating events, not field work.”

“We’re trying really hard to make a name for ourselves in this business. That’s damned hard when you’re located in Texas.” She placed her hands on her hips and glared at him defiantly.

God, she’s beautiful, he thought, letting his gaze roam over her lush body. “Why didn’t you just ask to see my research? I would’ve been happy to get copies for you.”

“That would be great. Can we make them now?”

Eli shook his head. “I don’t have the report here. I gave it to Troy.”

Giselle slammed the desk drawer shut. Her body stiffened. A dark shadow passed over her lovely face, like a cloud crossing the moon. Under her breath she muttered,

“Mon dieu.”

Giselle turned down Eli’s offer of banana-pecan pancakes for breakfast. Instead, she gulped a quick cup of black coffee and left his apartment, insisting she had a busy day ahead of her. She seems to be in a big hurry to get away from me, he thought. I don’t usually have that effect on women.

He decided to make pancakes for himself anyway. He mashed a ripe banana in a bowl, then added milk, an egg, a box of pancake mix, and a handful of chopped pecans.

As he dropped a dollop of batter on a hot skillet, the phone rang. Miranda’s name and number flashed on his caller ID.

“Hi,” he said, pressing the receiver between his ear and shoulder to keep his hands free. “How’s it going?”

“Good. Am I catching you at an okay time?”

“Actually, I’m in the middle of making pancakes.”

“Sorry, I forgot about the time difference. Why don’t you call me when it’s more convenient?”

He flipped a golden-brown pancake. “Where are you?”

“The coast of North Carolina, near the Outer Banks.”

“Cool. As soon as I eat and pull myself together, I’ll get back to you.”

“Sure, okay. I’m about to take a ferry out to one of the islands, so reception could be iffy. If we don’t connect, I’ll just phone later.”

“Later, then. Have fun.”

Аfter a short boat ride from the historic town of Beauport, Miranda debarked on Shackleford Banks. She pulled the brim of her pink baseball cap down low on her forehead to shield her face from the sun’s burning rays. Slinging her straw tote bag over her shoulder, she set off down the beach in search of the wild horses. Her tourist brochure said the herd had descended from horses brought from Spain four hundred years ago, who supposedly swam from shipwrecked vessels to this desolate, nine-mile-long island.

She took off her sneakers and waded in the warm surf. It caressed her feet like a gentle massage, so different from the ocean in New England, where even in August the water remained bitterly cold. Mid-August already. It’s hard to believe my vacation is almost over.

The sun beat down on her shoulders, testing the strength of her SPF 50 sunscreen, as her mind cycled around to Eli. I wish he were here to enjoy this with me. She imagined him cooking breakfast in the California apartment she’d never seen. Do men really make pancakes for themselves? Most single guys she knew gobbled down cold cereal or warmed up leftover pizza for breakfast. Once again, she wondered if he had a girlfriend in Napa as she recalled the image she’d seen in the crystal of the woman with the dark curls sucking his fingers.

Miranda kicked at the water angrily. She pulled out her cell phone and flipped it open. No signal, damn it. Shoving the phone back in her bag, she contemplated her relationship with Eli. The possibility of something long term between us is slim to nil, she admitted. Even if he’s not involved with anyone else, we live on opposite coasts. Long-distance romances never work out. She flashed back to her meeting with the tarot card reader in Santa Fe and wished she’d asked more about their future.

Pushing thoughts of Eli from her mind, she began scouring the beach for shells.

Miles of pristine sand stretched before her, sparkling white beneath the blazing sun. She spotted a conch shell partly buried in the sand and dug it out, but it was broken. After more than a dozen fruitless tries, she found one intact. Turning it over in her hand, she mused, it looks like a pussy with its blatant pink opening. She nestled the shell in her tote bag and continued walking. Next she snagged a sand dollar, then another. Carefully she wrapped them in Kleenex and added them to her bag.

Before long, she’d left the other the tourists far behind. She sat down on a dune and pulled a bottle of water from her tote bag. After resting a while, she ate the sandwich she’d brought along and gazed out across the water. Sunlight danced on the gray-green waves. Wind ruffled her hair. It’s so peaceful here. Again, her thoughts returned to Eli.

Wouldn’t it be fun to make love here on this beach? Miranda recalled the shooting stars she’d seen above Lake Michigan and the wishes she’d made with her girlfriends. Maybe I should just confront him outright. Clarify things. If he admits he’s involved with someone, I’ll cut my losses and move on. No sense wasting affection on someone whose interests lie elsewhere.

She climbed to the top of the dune and scanned the rolling landscape for wild horses. Far in the distance, she spotted a group of six or seven grazing. She turned to look in another direction and saw several more, but they, too, were a long way off.

Overhead, the sun beat down harshly. No trees cast shadows to shield her from its glare. A swim in the ocean would feel good right now. Wish I’d brought my swimsuit. She walked down to the water’s edge. There’s nobody around for miles, she rationalized, scanning the beach. What the hell? Quickly she stripped off her shorts, T-shirt, and underwear, and raced into the surf. The soothing water embraced her as she breast-stroked leisurely through the rippling waves. It’s not exactly cool. Still, it’s refreshing.

She rolled over on her back and floated a while in serene silence.

After fifteen or twenty minutes, she swam back to shore. Standing naked, staring out at the sea, she let the warm wind air-dry her body. She held her arms out parallel to the ground, the way the cormorants back in New England spread their wings to dry them.

Suddenly, Miranda sensed someone watching her. She turned around to face a half-grown bay colt about ten feet from her, pawing the sand. When she held out her hand to him, the shy colt backed away.

“What a beauty you are,” she said softly. “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you.”

The colt tossed his head, without taking his liquid, dark eyes off her. She inched toward him; he held his ground. Slowly, she took a few more baby steps. The colt stood still.

“Will you let me pat you?” she asked.

The colt tossed his head again and snorted.

Behind her, Miranda heard a click. Turning in the direction of the sound, she saw a balding middle-aged man holding a digital camera.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she said angrily.

Startled by the change in her voice, the colt trotted away.

She threw up her hands, exasperated. “Oh shit, now look what you’ve done.”

“Sorry,” the man apologized. “You looked so pretty, standing there with the horse. Like Lady Godiva befriending her mount. I couldn’t resist.”

Miranda grabbed her shorts and T-shirt and pulled them on, shoving her underwear in her tote bag. The man checked his camera.

“Want to see your picture?” he asked.

“You’ve got one hell of a nerve.”

The man laughed. “Yeah, I know. If it’s any consolation, your face doesn’t show.”

“If you had any decency, you’d erase the damn thing.” She jammed her baseball cap on over her wet hair.

“Are you sure you don’t want to see it, at least?”

Miranda’s curiosity got the better of her. “Oh, all right.”

She walked to the man’s side and peeked at the image in camera. Hmmm. It’s really good. The guy’s got an eye.

He handed her his business card. Scanning it, she noted the name of a national magazine under his own. “If this picture turns up in print or online, I’ll sue you, I promise,” she threatened.

He grinned at her, as if calling her bluff. “You should be so lucky. If you give me your e-mail address, though, I’ll send you a jpeg.”

A mischievous idea popped into her head. She dug into her bag, pulled out a scrap of paper and a pen, and scrawled Eli’s e-mail address. “How ’bout sending it to my boyfriend? It’ll make him wonder.”

The B&B’s back porch overlooked a garden of old roses. Miranda was sitting on a wicker settee, enjoying their sweet aroma and drinking iced tea when her cell phone rang.

“How was your trip to the island?” Eli asked her.

“All in all, very satisfying. I saw some wild horses, collected shells, and went swimming in the ocean.” If that photographer e-mails him the nude picture of me, he’ll see for himself. “What have you been up to?”

“Working, mostly.”

“On Saturday?”

“Grapes don’t stop growing on weekends.” He paused so long, she thought the call had dropped, before asking, “Miranda, did you tell anyone we were going to New Orleans?”

“I don’t remember. I might have said something to one of my girlfriends. Why?

Was it supposed to be a secret?”

“I’m still trying to figure out how those Frenchmen knew where to find me.”

Miranda finished her tea and set the empty glass on the floor, swinging her bare feet up onto the settee. “Did they? You said yourself you couldn’t be sure the two guys who accosted us in Jackson Square were the same ones who attacked you in San Francisco.”

“True.”

“How can you even be sure they were French?”

“When we started running away I heard one of them say ‘Arretez les.’ It means

‘Stop them’ in French.”

“Half the population of Louisiana speaks French,” she pointed out. “It’s more likely they were local thieves bent on robbing a couple of tourists.” I never told him about the scene I saw in the crystal. He’d probably think I’m nuts.

After another long pause, he said, “You may be right.”

“Have you run into any more problems since you’ve been back at work?”

“No. Surprisingly, it’s been pretty quiet so far.”

“Good.” She checked her toenails and thought, I really need a pedicure. “Look, Eli, I’m not discounting your theory. But if a competitor wanted to get you out of the picture to keep you from revealing what you know, wouldn’t they have tried again by now?”

“You’ve got a point,” he admitted, letting the subject drop. “So where are you headed next?”

“Home. I can’t believe my vacation is almost over.” She switched the phone to her other ear. Okay, time to find out where things stand between us. I need some clarity.

Butterflies fluttered in her stomach. She took a deep breath. “When I get back, I’d really like to have you come visit me. I’d like to show you around New England.”

“I’ve never been to New England.”

That’s not exactly a yes. “Eli, do you have a girlfriend in Napa?”

“No, there’s nobody special.”

“It’s just, well, it’s been fun hanging out together, when we weren’t running from bad guys, that is. I like you. I hope we can see each other again.”

“I like you, too. When I’ve straightened things out here, we’ll work something out. I hear Salem’s the place to be on Halloween.”

After he hung up, Eli kept hearing Miranda’s words ringing in his head: “Half the population of Louisiana speaks French.”

Giselle’s from Louisiana, he reminded himself, remembering the hint of an accent that lingered in her speech. He flashed back to last night when he’d caught her going through his desk drawers, and her response when he told her he’d given the Mort Jaune report to Troy: “Mon dieu.”

He picked up the remote and turned on the TV. For several minutes he channel-surfed, trying to find something worth watching, and eventually gave up. The only people I told about my trip to New Orleans were Coyote and Giselle. He switched off the TV, leaned back in his chair, and propped his feet up on the coffee table. For the umpteenth time he asked himself, Who had the opportunity to plant diseased vines in our fields between three and four years ago? And who bore a grudge against Meditrina?

Pieces of the puzzle slid together in his mind’s eye, forming a clear picture. He shook his head, wondering how he could’ve missed seeing what lay right in front of him.

Eli, you’ve been thinking with the little head instead of the big one.

For several long moments, Eli stood silently at the threshold to Troy Aransas’s office, staring at his boss’s back while Troy tapped away on his computer keyboard.

Finally he rapped on the open door and went in.

Troy spun around in his leather chair. “Hey, Eli. How’s it going?”

“I need to talk to you. Is this a good time?”

“Sure, sure.” Troy motioned for him to sit.

“Mind if I close the door?”

Troy smiled an uneasy smile. “Must be serious.”

“It is.” Eli shut the CEO’s door and pulled up a chair.

“Coffee?” Troy offered.

“No, thanks.” Eli crossed his right ankle over his left knee, trying to decide where to begin. I’ve rehearsed this speech a dozen times and still can’t think of an easy way to break it to him. Might as well just spit it out. “I know who destroyed Meditrina’s vines.”

“Oh? Which one of our French competitors did it?” Troy leaned forward, resting his elbows on the antique oak desk that had been his father’s when the old man ran the business. “I hope you have enough information to back up an accusation. If you’re right, the shit’s gonna hit the fan internationally.”

Eli shook his head. “It wasn’t one of our French competitors. Although that’s what I thought initially.”

“You’ve found out more since you sent me that report?” Troy shifted his position, as if he were having trouble getting comfortable in his expensive, ergonomically designed chair. “Good, that’s good.”

“Have you talked to Giselle Constant since she’s been back here?”

Troy frowned. “Well, yeah. Why?”

“Giselle planted vines infected with the Morte Jaune in Meditrina’s fields before she went to Texas to work for Coyote Fortuna. She acquired those diseased vines during the trip you took to France together three and a half years ago.”

“She told you that?”

“No, of course not.”

“How did you figure it out?”

“That’s a long story.”

Troy inhaled a deep breath, then let it out slowly. He picked up his coffee cup and held it between his hands for a while, as if drawing comfort from its warmth, before drinking. Eli studied his boss’s demeanor carefully, observing the subtle shifts in his expression. The lines between Troy’s eyebrows deepened, the corners of his mouth sagged. His head dipped slightly; his shoulders slumped.

“I suppose you know about our affair, too?”

Eli nodded. “It wasn’t a very well-kept secret, Troy.”

Troy shrugged.

“Poisoning the vineyard was Giselle’s way of taking revenge because you wouldn’t leave your wife for her, right?”

“So it seems.”

Watching Troy’s reaction to the news—sadness and resignation, instead of surprise or outrage—Eli suddenly realized it wasn’t news at all to his boss.

“You knew all along that she introduced the Morte Jaune into our vineyard, didn’t you?” he asked.

Troy looked up from his coffee cup and met Eli’s searching stare. He nodded.

Anger surged in Eli’s gut. His fists clenched involuntarily. He uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, glaring at his boss. “Who hired the goons to take me out? You or her?”

“They’re Giselle’s brothers.” Troy sighed. “They weren’t supposed to harm you, just scare you off. So you’d stop investigating the whole thing.”

Eli slammed his fist on the oak desk. “One of her brothers pulled a fucking knife on me. Did you know that?”

“Hey, you’re okay. Nobody got hurt.”

“No thanks to you.” Eli stood up and paced back and forth, the length of Troy’s office. Betrayal burned like hot coals in his chest. “Why didn’t you tell me? We’ve worked together for ten years, Troy. I thought we were friends.”

Troy held out his hands, palms up, in a gesture of helplessness. “I love her.”

“Even now, after she tried to ruin you?”

“What can I say?” His pained eyes searched Eli’s for understanding.

Eli flashed back to the nights he’d spent with Giselle, the lust she’d roused in him, and the great sex they’d had together. If Troy’s wife really was an “ice princess,” as Giselle claimed, he could easily imagine how his boss had fallen under the spell of a sultry Cajun temptress.

“What are you going to do now?” Troy asked.

The question had so many implications Eli couldn’t comprehend them all. “I honestly don’t know,” he said, and left Troy’s office.

Miranda stopped for lunch at a barbecue joint north of Raleigh, North Carolina.

She carried her pulled pork sandwich outside and ate at a picnic table in the shade of a huge live oak. It reminded her of the tree where Freeman, the hanging man, lived. When she’d finished, she dug into her oversized purse for her lipstick. Her fingers brushed the crystal from Uncle Bright’s field. Withdrawing the sparkling stone, she balanced it on the palm of her hand. Do you have a vision for me today?

As she gazed into the crystal, its wisps began to swirl like smoke rising from a candle’s flame. Slowly, they formed into shapes. A wide street with brick sidewalks. On both sides of the street rose elegant, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century mansions. Red, yellow, and copper leaves crunched under her feet as she and Eli walked hand in hand under a clear blue sky. Miranda recognized the scene: Salem’s Chestnut Street. October, her favorite time of the year.

For several moments she stared into the crystal, until the images faded. Am I really seeing the future? she wondered, closing her fingers around the stone. The crystal had accurately foretold the attack in New Orleans. What about the other visions it’s shown me? Angrily, she recalled the one of a dark-haired woman sucking Eli’s fingers in a vineyard.

Miranda slipped the crystal back into her purse. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see.

After his conversation with Troy, Eli sought solace in the fields where he’d spent most of his adult life. Strolling through Meditrina’s vineyards had always brought him a sense of peace. Now, however, he felt himself withering and dying inside, undermined by those closest to him.

Like these vines.

He trailed his fingers along the green-gold leaves and touched the ripe, purple grapes, knowing he was saying goodbye.

Holding his hand open, Eli gazed at the tattoo on his palm. His talisman, his link to Mother Earth and her abundance. I started working in this vineyard right after I finished college. It’s the only real job I’ve ever had. But knowing what I do, I can’t stay on here. What am I going to do now?

As if responding to his question, a voice in his head said, What do you want to do? He paused and gazed down the long row of vines. Good question. He plucked a grape and squeezed it between his fingers. Letting the juice run down his hand, he recalled his youthful aspirations, things he’d always imagined doing but had yet to achieve.

Travel to Europe. Write for Wine Spectator. Become a sommelier.

He considered getting a job with one of the other Napa vineyards. Perhaps he could try Sonoma. It wouldn’t be hard to do. He had plenty of experience and connections in the industry. Somehow, though, his heart wasn’t in it. It’s time for a change.

Eli turned around and walked back toward Meditrina’s offices. If I had Coyote’s money, I’d buy my own vineyard.

Thinking of his former co-worker, he remembered what Giselle had said when he caught her rifling his desk. “I’m worried that Fortuna Vineyards might be infected.” He’d assumed she’d simply used that excuse to keep him from guessing the real reason she wanted to learn what was in his Morte Jaune report. Should I tell Coyote about Giselle’s treachery? Perhaps she’s poisoned Fortuna’s vines as well.

In his small office overlooking the vineyard, Eli switched on his computer and picked up his e-mail. The first thing I have to do is get a new e-mail address, separate from Meditrina’s. He recognized most of the names in his inbox—colleagues and friends—but an unfamiliar one caught his attention. The subject line read: Lady Godiva.

He clicked on it and opened the attachment. A picture of a nude woman with purple-streaked hair popped up on his monitor. She stood on a sunny beach, holding out her hand to a bay colt. Eli smiled. Miranda. Even without the purple hair I’d recognize that body anywhere. His next thought was, Who took that photo? A twinge of jealousy accompanied the thought.

Gazing at the image, he recalled their conversation yesterday. Miranda had said,

“I’d like to show you around New England.” The idea brightened his gloomy mood, like the sun emerging from behind dark clouds. He picked up the phone and punched in Miranda’s number.

The scent of salt water tickled Miranda’s nostrils as she strolled along Salem’s Derby Street, near what was once the busiest harbor in America. Even though the sun shone brightly, autumn’s nip chilled the air. Here and there, smoke rose from chimneys.

After three months on the road, it seemed a bit strange to be home.

Home, however, would never be the same again. Shortly after she’d returned to Salem, a Realtor had contacted her about selling her father’s house. At first, she’d resisted. She’d lived in this house most of her life. But she had to admit the house felt empty without Danny Malone’s presence.

“Don’t you think it’s kinda creepy living there now that Dad’s dead?” her sister asked, wrinkling her nose. “It’s time to let go and move on, Miranda.”

“You just want the money,” Miranda insisted.

“Look who’s talking. You already got a bunch more than me,” Kelly shot back.

Their father had made Miranda the beneficiary of his life insurance policy, but he’d left the house to both daughters. Understandably, Kelly wanted her share. She was never close to Dad, Miranda thought angrily. Still, holding on to the house won’t bring him back.

In the end, it was Eli who tipped the scale. Next month, when he moved to Salem, a new chapter in her life would begin. It made sense to put the past behind her.

Miranda walked by a new age bookstore and noticed a display of crystals in its window. I wonder if those came from Uncle Bright’s fields. Near the store’s entrance she saw a sign that read Pyramid Books. Smiling, she remembered the secret pyramid in the mountains of Washington and the sex magician Lancelot Lucas who’d studied with a master drummer in Salem. I’ll have to look up his teacher, she promised herself, wondering if she’d ever run into Lancelot again.

Inside the store, she smelled incense that reminded her of the jasmine trees in the courtyard of the Garden of Eden. A woman wearing a turban and a purple robe sat at a table, shuffling a deck of cards. Miranda recalled the card reader she’d met in Santa Fe. I wish I’d asked her more about my life.

“I’d like you to tell my future,” she said to the woman in the turban.

The woman motioned for her to sit and handed Miranda the cards. “Shuffle these.”

When Miranda had finished shuffling, the woman told her to cut the deck. She did, then passed the cards back. The woman placed one face up on the table.

“The Queen of Wands,” she said, pointing at the card, which depicted a woman holding a long rod. “This signifies you. You’re a very creative person.”

Miranda giggled, remembering Lancelot’s description of a wand, and all the “wands” she’d held during the past few months.

The reader laid a second card on the table. “This is your past,” she said. “You’ve completed a long journey.” On the card Miranda saw a picture of a dancing jester. It looks like Eli on the day I met him.

“This shows the present.” The turbaned woman placed a third card beside the second. It pictured a voluptuous woman wearing a skimpy bikini standing in a lake; a muscular man knelt before her, holding her in a passionate embrace.

Miranda recognized the card: The Lovers. It had appeared in her reading in Santa Fe, too. “Oh my,” she said. It’s Eli and me.

The reader smiled and turned over a fourth card. It showed a woman with long, dark hair standing in front of a glowing globe of the Earth. “This represents your future. ‘The World.’ You’ll have everything you want and need. The world is yours.”

Gazing at the woman on the card, Miranda thought, she looks like me. The globe brought to mind Eli’s tattoo and her father’s prediction: Your future husband will hold the world in the palm of his hand.

“Thank you,” she said.

After paying the card reader, Miranda browsed around the store. She thumbed through several books, perused the jewelry cases, and looked at statues of fairies, angels, gods and goddesses. When she came to a rack that displayed packs of tarot cards, she examined several decks. She considered buying one, but an idea popped into her mind.

Why not create my own deck?

Packing up ten years’ worth of his professional life took less time than Eli had imagined. Troy had given him a nice severance package, which Eli thought might have been a bribe to keep him from revealing what he knew about Giselle.

At least I can take my time finding another job.

As he plunked his Rolodex into a box, a business card popped out and fluttered to the floor. Eli picked it up and read it. Will Quentin, Fine Wine Distributor, Boston, MA.

He recalled meeting Quentin at a wine tasting at San Francisco’s Palace, the evening before Giselle’s brothers first attacked him. Before his old life unraveled. That night seemed a century ago. He’d invited the distributor to visit Meditrina, hoping to expand their sales in New England. But when Quentin stopped by, Eli was already on the run.

He picked up the phone and punched in Quentin’s number.

“Sorry I missed you when you came to see the vineyard,” he said when the distributor answered. “I was out of town all summer.”

They chatted for a couple of minutes, then Eli told him he was moving to the Boston area soon. “Maybe we can meet for lunch.”

“If you’re looking for a job,” Quentin said, “I might have something for you.”

“Great, I’d like to hear about it.”

“Give me a call when you get here.”

“Thanks, I will.”

Tucking Quentin’s card in his wallet, he remembered Sybil’s words: There are no coincidences.

Leaves crunched underfoot as Miranda and Eli walked down Salem’s historic Chestnut Street. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century mansions, built by ships’ captains and wealthy China Trade merchants, bordered the wide, tree-lined street. In recent years, many of the huge old homes had been broken up into condos. She and Eli had sublet one from a couple of teachers Miranda knew who were on sabbatical for a year in Italy.

“In the summer, we can go visit them,” she suggested. “We’ll tour the vineyards in Tuscany and Umbria. Maybe you can get Will Quentin to pay your way.”

“Sounds good to me. I’ve always wanted to see Italy.”

She reached for Eli’s hand, and when she squeezed it, his tattoo felt warm against her palm. She’d worried that he might miss his job at Meditrina and his relaxed California lifestyle. But he seems happy here, she thought. Hope he can handle the harsh winters!

They passed through a wrought-iron gate and entered an imposing brick Federal-style mansion. Inside, they climbed a wide, carved wooden staircase that curved toward the second story, and another, narrower one that led to the third floor. Eli opened the door into their apartment. Sunshine spilled through a half-dozen windows, throwing rectangles of honey-colored light onto the pine floors. That’s what I like best about this place. All the light.

Her easel stood at one of the windows, holding a nearly finished painting of a man suspended upside down by one leg from the branch of a tall oak tree. On the wall nearby was a picture of a masked man wearing a harlequin costume. Two more paintings hung over the fireplace: one of a woman with long, silver hair gazing into a pond and another of a redhead driving an eighteen-wheeler. In between selling her father’s house, moving into this condo, and teaching school, Miranda had begun creating her own tarot deck.

Each card depicted someone she’d met on her cross-country journey. Already a gallery had expressed interest in showing the collection when she finished it. Only seventy-four more paintings to go, she told herself.

The scrying crystal she’d found at Uncle Bright’s place rested on the windowsill next to her easel. Occasionally Miranda still wondered about the scene she’d viewed in it of Eli and the woman in the vineyard, but she’d decided not to ask him. She didn’t intend to tell him everything about the golden cord either. Some secrets are meant to be kept, even between lovers—especially between lovers.

“It’s chilly in here. I’m going to light a fire,” Eli said, as he hung their coats on a pegboard beside the door. “Then, I’m going to light your fire.”

Watching him stack logs in the fireplace, she remembered the night of shooting stars over Lake Michigan and smiled at how perfectly everything had turned out. He lit the kindling and flames licked the wood. Between her legs, Miranda felt flames of her own spark to life.

She pulled her sweater over her head and tossed it on the sofa. When Eli heard her unzip her jeans, he turned and grinned at her. Following her cue, he quickly removed his own clothing. He stretched out on the rug in front of the fireplace, his cock pointing toward her like a heat-seeking missile as she knelt over him. She guided it to the edge of her opening and slowly lowered herself until he filled her completely. As they began moving together, gently at first, then faster as their urgency grew, Miranda thought, sometimes wishes do come true.

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A Ravenous Romance™ Lovestrology™ Original Publication

www.ravenousromance.com

Tarotica

Copyright © 2009 by Amber Austin

Ravenous Romance™

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Suite 123A

Beverly, MA 01915

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review.

ISBN-13: 978-1-60777-092-3

This book is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.