Night of the Hawk Read online

  Night of the Hawk

  Also by Vonna Harper:

  Surrender

  Roped Heat

  “Wild Ride” in The Cowboy

  “Restraint” in Bound to Ecstasy

  Night Fire

  “Breeding Season” in Only With a Cowboy

  “Night Scream” in Sexy Beast V

  Going Down

  Night of the Hawk

  VONNA HARPER

  APHRODISIA

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  Night of the Hawk

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  1

  Captured in flight, the hawk commanded most of the photograph. Its wings were spread as if embracing its world, talons stretched, haunting yellow eyes seemingly trained not on the world below but at whoever had taken the picture. The rest of the picture was a blur of greens and browns, undoubtedly an image of the forest it lived in, but the hawk’s image was so sharply defined Smokey could make out the individual tail feathers.

  Stepping closer, Smokey continued her study of the 11-by-14-inch picture that had been placed at eye level on a wall of the art gallery. Except for the faint drum and flute notes from the Native American instrumental playing in the background, the gallery was silent. She could hear her heart beating, feel the pull and release in her lungs as she breathed.

  What could be so incredible, mesmerizing, captivating, eerie?

  Eerie?

  Yes, she acknowledged, there was something otherworldly about both the hawk and the way the photographer had frozen the predator in time and space. It wasn’t that large a bird, certainly not as imposing as an eagle or osprey, and yet there was no doubt of its confidence and power. What would it be like to have such faith in one’s physical ability, to be utterly at home in the wilderness?

  “Pretty amazing, isn’t it?”

  Startled, Smokey turned around. Behind her stood the young woman who’d greeted her when she’d first come in the door. As they were the only two people in the building, she shouldn’t have been surprised that the woman—whose name tag identified her as Halona—had joined her, but the hawk had captured her attention.

  “Amazing is the right word, all right,” Smokey acknowledged as she returned to her study of the photograph. Her fingers tingled, and she longed to be holding a paintbrush. “I wonder, do you know who took that shot? I’d love to paint the bird.”

  “That’s one of Mato’s creations. In fact, he’s responsible for every wildlife and wilderness photograph in here.”

  “Mato?” The name seemed to settle on her tongue. “He’s local?”

  “As local as they get. I don’t know how many generations his family goes back. Certainly long before white men arrived.”

  Halona was dark skinned with high cheekbones, most likely Native American herself. “No wonder he knew where to find this magnificent creature.” Smokey indicated the hawk, who now seemed to be watching her. “But that doesn’t account for the quality. What does he do, work for National Geographic?”

  “Hardly, although I think he’s good enough. He contracts some with BLM—Bureau of Land Management—in addition to managing his own timber acreage.”

  Although Smokey wanted to say something, for some reason she couldn’t concentrate enough to put the words together. In her mind’s eye she clearly saw Mato slipping silently through the forest, a shadow among shadows, camera at the ready, senses acutely tuned to his surroundings. He saw the forest not as a great unknown but as home, his. Maybe the creatures who lived in the forest sensed this about him and shared their wilderness knowledge with him.

  A man like that would be physically hard, primal, alive, real. If he saw a woman he desired, there’d be no game playing, no dance of attraction, no slow getting to know her. Like the animals who shared the forest with him, he’d claim his mate, take her down, and fuck with her.

  Struggling to ignore the heat chasing up the sides of her neck at the decidedly uncivilized thought, Smokey concentrated on swallowing. “What do you think?” she tried. “Any chance he’d sell me that picture? I notice it’s not for sale.”

  “None of his work is, because he wants visitors to see and appreciate what exists around here.”

  Around here meant the Oregon coast, specifically the vast forest that extended to the seashore and that was in danger of swallowing the little town of Storm Bay, where she would be spending the next few days.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Halona continued, “I can give you directions to where he lives. Hopefully your vehicle’s made for off-road travel because the road into his place can get pretty hairy, depending on the weather.”

  “Mine’s four-wheel drive,” she supplied. Her gaze strayed to the one window and beyond it, the gray clouds and wind-whipped trees signaling an approaching storm. As though she didn’t feel isolated enough. “He wouldn’t be there this time of day, would he?”

  “I doubt it. I don’t know how pressed you are for time, but I’m sure of where he’ll be tonight.”

  A small alarm went off in her mind, but she kept her expression neutral. “Oh?”

  “The meeting.” Halona made it sound as if nothing else mattered. “The whole town’s going to be there. There’re even reporters hanging around, although maybe they’re still here because that man’s been missing since a week ago.”

  Not breathing, Smokey waited to see if Halona would ask if she was one of those reporters. Instead, Halona shrugged as though dismissing the whole thing.

  Lying could come back to haunt her, and damn it, she wanted to be open and honest with this engaging young woman, but she had a job to do, one that wouldn’t be easy and maybe would be impossible if she didn’t keep certain things to herself, starting with her full name, Smokey Powers. Reconciling herself to deception—although she already knew the answer—she asked where the meeting was going to be held and when it would start.

  “The school auditorium, seven o’clock. The school’s the only place large enough to hold everyone.”

  “It sounds important.”

  “It is to us. What’s at stake is whether the land our people have lived on in harmony for generations will remain unspoiled or if greed…I’m sorry, I’m sure you don’t care. You’re on vacation. You are, aren’t you?”

  Shrugging, Smokey divided her attention between Halona and the piercing yellow eyes that wouldn’t leave her alone and that seemed to have seen beneath her deception and omission. “How will I know who Mato is?”

  “He’ll be speaking, I’m sure of that. And even if he doesn’t—” pressing her hand to her chest, Halona sighed, “—he’s the sexiest man alive. Early thirties and in his sexual prime. Unless you’re dead from the neck down, you’ll know.”

  “Oh.”

  “Okay.” Halona grinned. “Maybe not the sexiest man alive but definitely the finest representative of his sex I’ve ever seen, not that I’ve observed that many in this one-horse town.”

  She hadn’t come here to lust after a man. She’d driven south and west from Portland because what had happened in Storm Bay—not just recently but over
a long period of time—had gotten her reporter’s juices flowing—more than just flow: she’d been both fascinated and horrified by what her digging had turned up. When she’d told her editor at Northwest News about the story she wanted to do, his reaction had been exactly what she’d wanted.

  “Hot damn, that’s unbelievable. Fucking unbelievable! Go for it! Your instincts have yet to fail you, which is what makes you so damn good at what you do. Just be careful. There’s something seriously weird going on there.”

  Well, careful didn’t get the story researched and written. Probing, listening, watching, questioning, and sometimes taking chances did. And because she was who and what she was, she was willing to take those chances.

  “I don’t know about trying to approach him,” she said, pretending a hesitation she didn’t feel or at least wasn’t willing to admit. “If he’s all involved in this meeting, he’s not going to want to talk about selling a picture or giving me permission to paint it.” Taking a deep breath, she looked at the photograph again. Yes, no denying it, the hawk was staring at her. How could she not paint something that intense? “But if I go, I’ll at least get some idea of how my request will be received, don’t you think?”

  “When it comes to Mato, I don’t make predictions. You know that saying about what you see is what you get? Well, there’s a lot more to him than what shows on the surface, not that I have any objections to the physical package.”

  “He sounds interesting.”

  “Interesting?” Halona winked. “Let’s talk after you’ve laid eyes on him. See if you still say the same thing. If I was ten years older—”

  “Is he married?”

  “No. Not sure why. Maybe because he’s so restless.”

  Like me. “Mato? Is that his first or last name?”

  “First. Full name, Mato Hawk.”

  Against her better judgment, she again glanced at the photograph. “Same as the bird.”

  “There’s nothing woo-woo about the connection. At least I don’t think so. After all, he’s taken thousands of wildlife pictures; you just happen to have zeroed in on this one of the red tail.”

  Halona explained that the rich, russet red coloring of the predator’s broad, rounded tail identified it as the largest hawk species, this one weighing close to four pounds. What fascinated Smokey was that the wingspan could be as much at fifty-six inches, and its cry resembled a hoarse, rasping scream—two pieces of information Mato had told Halona.

  “I’m sure he believes I’m nothing more than a curious kid.” Halona sighed. “Little does he know that when I’m asking him about his photographs, it’s so I can stand close to him. What is it about some men? They give off this electrical charge, this heat. Shit. Mato’s heat is enough to start the woods on fire.”

  You have to be exaggerating. “Sounds fas—ah, about the meeting. Will there be fireworks? I’m thinking it must be about something important if so many people are going to be there.”

  The youthful eyes sobered. “Yes,” she said slowly. “That’s something everyone here feels passionately about. It might not matter to outsiders, but there’s no reason for greed and money to jeopardize this precious land, none at all! Whatever it takes to protect it, we will do, and no one is more committed than Mato.”

  Committed enough to kill?

  Before she could come up with something to say, the gallery phone rang. Rolling her eyes, Halona headed toward the front counter. Alone again, Smokey deliberately avoided looking at the endlessly gliding hawk. Though the art gallery was small, the pieces on display were first class. Mato’s photography was the star of the show, but among Storm Bay’s residents were also a master wood-carver, an oil painter specializing in ocean scenes, two spectacular free-form metal pieces reflecting the overhead lighting, and excellent pottery in a subtle rainbow of colors.

  This wasn’t what she had expected when she’d decided to come to Storm Bay to dig into a number of mysterious deaths going back more than a hundred years. Small and isolated, the town had apparently come into existence as a fishing village, although Indians had lived here since before recorded history.

  She’d learned that with fishing in decline and timber harvesting controlled by complex regulations, the town was losing its economic base. It had lost some population but not as much as she’d expected—proof maybe that something beyond economics kept people here. Whatever that something was, it obviously fed some residents’ creativity.

  What fed Mato Hawk’s creativity, his photographer’s eye, his patience, his ability to find and capture what lived among the massive, rain-fed trees? One picture was of a great bull elk nearly hidden among dense ferns, a thin ray of sunlight highlighting its antlers. Another, obviously taken with a powerful zoom lens, showed three young foxes—kits, she thought they were called—wrestling while their exasperated-looking mother watched. A third shot zeroed in on a white butterfly about to land on dead pine needles sprinkled with either rain or dew. A close look revealed a spider clinging to one of the pine needles.

  A man of contrasts? One willing to stand up for what he believed in and speak passionately, one capable of becoming part of his surroundings so he could identify and share its life force?

  A sexy man.

  She didn’t know about the sexy part. After all, Halona might not yet be twenty-one and could be filled with the romantic notions that came with youth and ignorance. Once she’d put a few more years behind her, Halona would learn there was more to a man than what lay between his legs. Broad shoulders and narrow hips might still get Smokey to occasionally, very occasionally, spread her legs, but it would take a hell of a lot more than that before she’d even consider hooking her life with some man.

  And until or if she found the man with that nebulous something, she’d concentrate on a career she loved. And do a little painting on the side.

  Glad she’d left her cell phone in her car, because she didn’t want anyone guessing the real reason for her being here if a work-related call came in, she continued her aimless wandering. She’d come into the art studio because she had time to kill until the meeting started. Oh, she could have stayed in the cabin she’d rented, but doing nothing always made her a little crazy. She didn’t want to go into the one bar in town at which she figured the other reporters would be killing time, because she didn’t want anything they said to influence her—or for them to know she was here before absolutely necessary. All too soon word would get around that the driving force behind the Northwest News award-winning column “Just the Facts” was hot on a story.

  Some fifteen minutes later, Smokey pushed open the gallery door and stepped into a swirling wind. Lowering her head against flying pine needles and other debris, she made her way to her SUV and closed herself in. When she picked up her cell phone, she saw she had two messages, both from her editor. True to his nature, he had kept his messages brief: “Call me.”

  “You were supposed to check in,” he snapped when she got through to him.

  “I did. Called this morning to let you know I was almost there, remember?”

  “What have you been doing since then? This assignment you gave yourself’s making me uneasy. If you’re right about a series of deaths passing as accidents when they’re really murders, that’s serious shit. It’s bad enough that no one’s seen hide nor hair of what’s-his-name in over a week—now you’re there alone in enemy territory.”

  “His name was…is Flann Castetter, and so far I don’t have proof that this is enemy territory.” Feels a bit like it.

  “The official search for Flann’s been called off. Did you know that?”

  “Yes,” she said without revealing that a state-police source had told her yesterday. “There’s no sign of foul play, nothing to justify expending more man hours looking for someone who may have decided he’d taken enough heat for a while and was getting out of Dodge.”

  “He brought the heat on himself,” he pointed out unnecessarily. “Him and the rest of that NewDirections bunch. I can’t say I bl
ame the locals for not taking kindly to that resort proposal of theirs.”

  She muttered something to the effect that she agreed, but she didn’t bother adding that Castetter’s disappearance might have been the latest in a number of strange things to have happened around Storm Bay. She’d already laid out what she’d uncovered and didn’t need him to keep warning her to be careful. Hell, she wouldn’t be the successful newshound she was if she’d taken the safe route, if she didn’t question and probe. Let other reporters chase after celebrities. She thrived on real stories, gut churning sagas about real people.

  People like Mato Hawk?

  Trying not to own up to the shiver down her back and a certain increase of heat on her breasts and in her crotch, she told her editor she’d call him after tonight’s public hearing. Then she hung up before he could get another word in. However, instead of starting her vehicle and going to one of the five cabins that passed for a motel in Storm Bay, she stared out at the world around her. The art gallery was set back several hundred feet from coastal Highway 101 at the end of a narrow gravel road that snaked through the dense vegetation. Though there were signs that someone had recently cut growth back from the road, what remained made her think of a living green wall.