The Doctor's Medicine Woman Read Online Free

to make her grandmother proud by doing right by the twins. Jared and Josh would know what it meant to be Kolheek when she was through. She could take great pride in that.
    A frown bit into his brow as if something worrisome had just then entered his mind. “Maybe you can help me to understand something. Can you tell me what she meant today? Your grandmother, I mean. With that cryptic parting phrase she gave me? The one about fate? And seeing what it had in store?”
    The sudden anxiety clouding Travis’s gaze had a startling effect on Diana. Empathy enveloped her like the warm blanket of sunshine that covers the New England mountains each summer.
    Travis continued, “She wouldn’t let me bring the boys home, get them settled, only to deny me the right to adopt them after your stay, would she?”
    His distress turned to raw fear, and Diana thought her heart would surely rend in two. And in that instant, bells and whistles sounded in her head, red warning flags waved furiously. She had no business caring so much about this man’s reactions to her grandmother’s words. No business whatsoever.

Chapter Two
    T hen we’ll see what fate has in store.
    Her grandmother’s words had flitted through Diana’s head more than once since she’d left the reservation with Travis. She remembered the unsettled feeling the obscure yet seemingly momentous statement had stirred in her as she stood with Travis before the Council.
    Diana’s first thought had been that the remark had been meant for her benefit, and she’d been bewildered by what message her grandmother might be trying to relay to her. But hearing Travis’s doubts regarding her grandmother’s intentions now had Diana wondering if maybe he was right. Maybe her grandmother had been issuing some kind of warning to Travis about the boys. That did make more sense. But if this was so, then it was a cruel thing for her grandmother to have done to Travis. The man was trying to do something good here. Something honorableand compassionate. Now he was being made to worry about having the twins taken from him after opening his home —and his heart— to Jared and Josh. Would her grandmother have done something so unkind?
    Sympathy for Travis pained Diana’s heart. He needed reassurance. She could tell from the expression on his face, from the doubt shadowing his intense, black eyes.
    “To my knowledge, the Council has never retracted a promise,” she told him softly. “And they did make you a promise today. They said they wanted you and the boys to become a family. To the Kolheek, a person’s word means everything—honor, pride, honesty, integrity. A person’s character is only as good as his or her word. I cannot believe…”
    Her voice faltered and then trailed away as she tucked her bottom lip between her teeth. As much as she wanted to assure him, she refused to tell him anything other than the full and honest truth.
    After expelling a resigned sigh, she said, “But I cannot mislead you. This situation is far different than any I’ve ever experienced. The Council is concerned about the boys. About their living away from their culture. About your being single.” She sighed. “Until the adoption papers are signed by each Council member and the documents are in your hands, then…I would suppose that anything is possible.”
    “Great.” His utterance was soft, more to himself than to anyone else.
    Again, compassion squeezed her in its tight grip. “The Council did say they wanted you to have the boys.”
    “Only two of the members actually spoke,” he reminded her.
    “They were the Council representatives. They spoke the thoughts of everyone. If even one member had disagreed, you can be sure he or she would have spoken up.”
    Gratitude tinged his tone as he murmured his appreciation. She smiled at him, her stomach suddenly feeling all giddy and…and strange.
    Just then a plastic drinking straw from one of the boys’ sodas came flying over Travis’s head,