Fated

see him. It’s not like I’m blind. He’s gorgeous. Exactly what teenage dreams are made of. Falling for a boy like that is easy to do. But make no mistake, a boy like that has heartbreaker written all over him, and the last thing I want is for you to get hurt—or worse.”
    I glare, my face a mask of defiance, hating her words. Partly because I don’t want to believe them and partly because I fear that they’re true. “By worse, you mean pregnant ? Like when you got knocked up with me at sixteen?”
    “Yeah,” she says. “Is that such a bad thing?” She fiddles with the long line of small silver hoops that hang from her multipierced ear—a sure sign she’s searching for just the right words. “Look, Daire, as much as I don’t regret having you—not for one single second—I don’t want you to end up sixteen and pregnant like I did. Is that such a crime?”
    I roll my eyes and look away. We’ve had this talk countless times, starting way back when I was too young to hear it and it bordered on wildly inappropriate. “It’s not like that,” I say. “He’s not like that. You’ve got it all wrong.”
    But no sooner are the words out when I realize I waltzed straight into her trap. Her eyes widening, lips curling in triumph when she says, “How would you know? I thought you just met him today ?”
    I turn away. So annoyed I have to fight to keep quiet—keep the storm of angry retorts confined to my head.
    “Come on, Daire.” Her voice rings much sterner than the words imply. “Get your stuff, so we can get the heck out of here. Oh, and when you’re done packing, be sure to leave a note for Paloma, thanking her for doing such a stellar job at screwing up as badly with you as she did with your dad.”
    “What?” My eyes widen, casting frantically around the room.
    But Jennika just shakes her head, brows slanted, lips flattened in fury.
    I push away from the counter and race down the hall—the sight of Paloma’s empty bed confirming the worst. “How’d you get in?” I whirl on Jennika, voice filled with panic.
    Reading her look of confusion when she glances between the bed and me, saying, “What do you mean? The door was wide open.”

thirty-nine
    “I stopped by with Kachina—had just gotten her secured in her stall when I found Paloma collapsed at the table in her office.” Chay meets us at the door of the tiny adobe. His eyes are bloodshot and red-rimmed, tainted with worry. “Looks like she hit her head pretty hard when she went down, which only complicates matters.”
    “And so you brought her here ?” Jennika plants herself in the entry—hands clutching her hips as she eyeballs the room and everyone in it with a disapproving glare.
    But Chay knows how to handle her, which means he ignores her by directing his focus to me. “She’s slipping in and out of consciousness, but every time she wakes up, she asks to see you.”
    “Hey, I’ve got a question.” Jennika pipes up, her voice as condescending as the look on her face, insisting on being heard even though no one wants to listen. “Why isn’t she in a hospital? Don’t you think they can help her more than these people can?” She arcs her arm in a wide sweeping motion, indicating the older Native American, who I assume is the medicine man, and his much younger apprentice who sits at a small hand-carved table beside him. “No offense,” she adds, looking at them, but their faces remain stoic, immobile, completely unmoved by her words.
    “Just because you don’t understand something doesn’t mean it lacks validity,” Chay says, his voice calm and even, his gaze prompting Jennika to clamp her lips shut and find a wall to go sag against.
    “Can I see her?” I direct my words at Chay, the medicine man, and his apprentice, unsure who’s in charge.
    The medicine man nods his consent, as Chay reaches for my elbow and steers me toward her room. The sight of it prompting Jennika to push away from the wall, eager to follow, but I nix it just as quickly. Shaking my head in warning, I chase it with my very best don’t even think about it look. Knowing I’m just buying time—that I’ll pay for it later—but I’ll face that hurdle when it comes, for now I just need to deal with the present.
    Chay ushers me into a small, spare room, stopping beside a dark-haired woman leaning over Paloma, her hands moving in the space just a few inches above Paloma, as though working the energy.
    “Chepi,” he says. “Her