Mornings were generally quiet at the store. Oh, sure, you had the diehards who were eager to hit the shopping trail as soon as they were done with breakfast, but most of the time, the real crowds didn’t show up until well after lunch, and often liked to linger until I shooed them out at closing time. I sympathized with their frustration over most of the stores closing by six — there wasn’t much to do in Sedona except shop, hike, or go out to eat — but that didn’t mean I wanted to be stuck at the store at all hours just because someone was used to shopping until nine back home. When in Rome….
At any rate, after the early birds had come and gone, I figured it was safe enough to try making a call to the Patriot Uniform Company. I’d already looked up their contact information on my laptop — no point in letting the snoops know what I was up to — so it was just a matter of timing.
No one had pulled into the parking lot. I figured I’d have at least a couple of minutes free. Better to do it now.
I picked up my cell phone and dialed the number, reading it off the site I’d cached on my MacBook Air.
A vaguely hostile female voice said, “Patriot Uniform Company.”
Since I had dealt with a lot worse over the years than snotty-sounding operators, I replied calmly, “Hi, I was wondering if you could provide me with some information on one of your products?”
“Would you like to talk to someone in our sales department?”
“Sure.” That sounded reasonable enough. After all, it was the salespeople who would probably know more about which items were sold to whom. I waited as the operator patched the call through.
An infinitely friendlier male voice came over the line. “Hi, this is Ben Parsons. Can I help you?”
“Hi, Ben,” I said. “My name is Karen Sherman, and I’m with an outfit in Boulder, Colorado.” I knew better than to give the guy any real information, no matter how friendly he might sound. And my phone had all its caller ID information blocked, so anyone on the other end of the line wouldn’t be able to figure out where I was calling from…unless the Patriot Uniform Company had far more sophisticated equipment than I thought.
“Sure, Karen. How can I help you?”
“We’re looking to purchase approximately one hundred jumpsuits. I was thinking black, with utility pockets on the legs. A friend recommended your company, and said he thought the ones numbered ‘23111056’ might be a good fit.”
“Let me check on that — we produce a large number of items, and I don’t have all the SKUs memorized.”
“No problem.” I shifted the cell phone from one hand to the other and looked over at the door when I noticed movement outside, then relaxed. Just someone using my parking lot as a throughway to the ATV rental place next door. At another time, I might have mentally cursed the person in question for using my lot as an auxiliary road, but right then, I wasn’t going to worry about it.
“Ms. Sherman?” Suddenly, Ben Parsons didn’t sound quite so friendly.
“Um, yes?”
“I don’t know where your friend got his information, but we’ve never manufactured a jumpsuit with that particular SKU.”
“Really?”
“I’m afraid so. Maybe he got the name of our company mixed up with someone else.”
“Oh, wow, I’m so sorry,” I said. “I’ll have to double-check with my friend…he could have written down the wrong SKU or something. I apologize for wasting your time.”
“It’s no problem. You have a nice day.” And he hung up abruptly, as if he didn’t want to run the risk of me asking any more questions.
What the…? I didn’t pretend to be psychic, but I thought I was a pretty good judge of people, and though I didn’t know this Ben Parsons from Adam, I had the distinct impression he was lying. Why, I couldn’t begin to guess.
Unless Grayson really was involved in some sort of secret government test or project. I suppose if that’s what’s going on, then this Mr. Ben Parsons would have plenty of reasons why he wouldn’t want to say who those jumpsuits had been sold to…or even admit that his company manufactures them at all.
Of course, that took me right back to the beginning. I’d already suspected Grayson might have been involved in some sort of covert operation, but if that was the case, I couldn’t understand why he’d been left to wander around in the desert. Lance had already filled me in on just how sophisticated the government’s scanning and surveillance equipment was; if some secret operation had lost a man out in the wastes between Sedona and the New Mexico border, you could be damn sure they’d be able to find him. Hell, according to Lance, they’d probably be able to pin a scorpion down to a single square yard, let alone a grown man.
Lance. I wished I could discuss Grayson with him, but that wasn’t going to happen — I could only imagine the lecture he’d give me for taking in a stranger and not reporting it to anyone. Not to mention the weird baggage between us, the baggage neither one of us wanted to acknowledge. After all, we were just friends.
Right.
At least I was able to admit to myself that I was attracted to Lance, wanted something more from him than friendship. He’d always maintained a neutral stance with me, but every once in a while, I’d catch an odd look in his eyes, something that told me maybe he wasn’t quite as disinterested as he wanted me to believe.
Or maybe I was just flattering myself.
One time, after Lance had just left the UFO Depot, Kiki remarked in overly dramatic tones, “I’m a rebel, Dottie…a loner.” I’d stared at her blankly for a moment until I realized my little sister was quoting a line from a PeeWee Herman movie where PeeWee was trying to give the brush-off to a female friend who was just a little too interested in him. Trust Kiki to pull up some obscure bit of ’80s pop culture and apply it to Lance.
In a weird way, it did fit, though. Lance had done a pretty good job of cultivating his “lone wolf” persona. I knew he’d been in Special Forces before he was recruited for the Army’s remote viewing project, but other than that, Lance hadn’t revealed squat about his past. Maybe he was hiding some deep, dark secret, something he believed would keep us apart…or maybe he only maintained that pose because it made a good excuse for holding me at arm’s length.
Contrast that with Grayson, who seemed almost too giving, too open. Not that he had much to be open about, because at the moment, his past was apparently a deep, dark hole, but at least I could tell he wasn’t hiding anything from me on purpose. And now that the jumpsuit was apparently a dead end, I didn’t have a clue as to where I should look next.
Well, that wasn’t precisely true. Even though Persephone was out of town, I knew I didn’t need a psychic to delve into Grayson’s past. Among my acquaintance were several hypnotherapists who’d probably be willing to lend a hand. It wouldn’t exactly be a past-life regression, since all I really wanted to know was who Grayson was and where he’d come from, but maybe a hypnosis session would help to get past that barrier, shine a little light into the dark that shrouded his origins.
First, though, I had to get through the UFO tour tonight. I’d already explained to Grayson that I had to go out that evening, although he’d only raised an eyebrow when I tried to describe a UFO night tour to him. He was too polite to say anything, but I got the distinct impression he was thinking, Wow, people actually pay for that?
At least by that point, I knew I could leave him at the house with no negative repercussions, but something still felt wrong about it. Maybe it was only that I hadn’t left him there alone at night before this, or maybe I was beginning to pick up some of what Persephone referred to as her “spider sense.” Either way, it didn’t really matter. I wouldn’t cancel the tour, not when almost a grand was riding on it.
“Everything is going to be fine,” I said aloud to the empty store, although at the moment I couldn’t say whether I was trying to reassure the universe…or just myself.
Lance
He leaned against the side of his Jeep and tried not to scowl as he surveyed the group Kara had assembled for the night’s UFO-watching tour. Ten in all, which was probably why she had refused to cancel the trip. That was a serious chunk of change. Even now she stood in front of the motley assortment of tourists, holding the military-spec night-vision goggles she used for the tours and explaining how they worked.
One group of four appeared to be college-age kids, all of whom were trying to look serious but who couldn’t help but trade typical twenty-something side-eyes at each other as Kara described the various types of UFOs that had been spotted over Sedona and how to track them. Lance wondered what the hell they were doing on a UFO tour if they didn’t believe in the phenomenon to begin with. Maybe a dare. Or maybe they were already bored with Sedona’s limited nightlife and were looking for something unusual to do.
In addition to the kids, there were two married couples, one probably in their early thirties, the other somewhere in their mid-fifties. They all seemed pretty serious, listening intently as Kara gave her spiel. The last two were both women who looked to be in their late forties, with the sort of wide-eyed but also piercing gaze that Lance recognized all too well from countless MUFON meetings and UFO symposiums. These were true believers, come here to either reinforce some previous close encounters, or desperately trying to prove to themselves that what they believed wasn’t just smoke and fairy tales.
It’s a lot of things, but fairy tales it ain’t. Some days, he wished it really was all crap. Maybe then he could have some peace. But the aliens seemed to have returned from their sabbatical, and he had to stay on guard.
His gaze moved to Michael Lightfoot, who was a watchful shadow near the rear end of the UFO Night Tours van. Lance had driven Michael here, and they’d take Lance’s Jeep out to the site. Kara would drive the van. Luckily, this group seemed okay with being driven to the site; sometimes people stubbornly insisted on taking their own vehicles, even if they weren’t suited for the terrain. The Night Tours van might look shabby on the outside — he still recalled Persephone’s crack about it being their “Scooby van” — but it had a beefed-up suspension and run-flat tires. Not true four-wheel drive, unlike his Jeep, but it could handle the ground at the sites Kara used, unlike some tourist’s rented Chevy Malibu.
“Everybody got it?” Kara asked, and the group responded with a variety of head nods and “uh-huh”s. They all piled into the van as she headed to the driver’s-side door.
He approached her and said, “Boynton, right?”
“Yep,” she replied. “I figured if the UFOs don’t want to come out and play, we have a better chance of seeing the orbs in that area than up on Schnebly.”
Her tone was casual, but something in her expression made him pause and give her a sharp look. It wasn’t worry — he would have understood that — but instead something close to preoccupation, as if her thoughts were someplace else. And that bothered him, because tonight she needed to be sharp. Chances were, nothing would happen, but if it did….
He asked, “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” She shrugged, her hair slipping over her shoulders as she did so. Even in the uncertain light of the one street lamp in front of the shop, those long strands gleamed gold.
He’d always wondered what that hair would look like spread out on a pillow next to him.
Well, you’re not going to find out any time soon. “All right. We’re right behind you.”
A nod, and she turned away from him to climb into the driver’s seat of the van before slamming the door with a resounding thud. He didn’t know if the slam had been intentional or not. He got the distinct impression she wasn’t all that happy to have him and Michael along as babysitters. When it came down to it, Lance had a thing or ten he would rather have been doing tonight, too, but Kara’s safety overrode everything else. Frankly, he didn’t really give two shits about the tourists, although he supposed it would be bad for business and tourism in general if one of these trips went sideways and word got out.
He went back to the Jeep and slid behind the wheel. Michael was already waiting in the passenger seat.
“Hope you packed a flask, my friend,” Lance remarked, to which Michael only gave him a level stare and a small head shake.
Sometimes Lightfoot had absolutely no sense of humor.
Kara
I bounced the van along Boynton Pass Road, fingers gripped around the steering wheel. Luckily, the tourists were busy talking amongst themselves and didn’t seem to notice my preoccupation. That is, the group of four college students were being almost too boisterous, chattering and laughing. Maybe they were feeling uneasy and were overcompensating. Didn’t really matter. Their commotion made it easy for me to avoid engaging any of the other passengers in conversation.
The road was paved, but it had been years since it had gotten anything more than a casual patch job, and it was giving the shocks a run for their money. I didn’t mind too much. It gave the impression that we really were going way off the beaten path, far from the restaurants and shops that lined 89A, the town’s main drag.
Out here was pure inky darkness. In a few hours, a quarter moon would rise, but in the meantime, there wasn’t anything to interfere with the view. I remembered the first time Grandpa brought Kiki and me out here to see the stars. Of course, Kiki had run around, looking at everything but the sky, but I’d been transfixed by the expanse of the Milky Way that revealed itself in the indigo-blue skies above the desert town. I’d never realized that many stars filled the heavens. I’d fallen in love.
It took me a few years more to realize not everything that glittered in the night sky was that beautiful.
I pulled off to the side of the road, at a spot where a trailhead dead-ended. We’d hike out into the juniper and mesquite from here. Not too many snakes in this area, thank God, not that they’d be much of a problem even on a warm night like this. Our group actually ran more risk of startling some javelinas and having to scurry out of the way of the odd-looking boar-like creatures. They did tend to be pretty territorial.
“Okay, we’re here,” I called over my shoulder, and the chatter dropped in volume somewhat but didn’t stop altogether. Fine. With any luck, the twenty-somethings would scare off any wild animals within a quarter-mile radius.
We all climbed out of the van and stood waiting in the gravelly sand at the road’s border. A few seconds later, Lance’s Jeep pulled in and parked a few yards away. The two men got out, Michael towering over Lance by half a head, although Lance was certainly not short. They paused a short distance away from the group, obviously waiting for me to give the rest of my little speech.
“I know you’re all eager to get out there, so I’ll make this quick,” I said, using the brisk, no-nonsense tones I found worked best for these tours. “We all need to stick together. No wandering off — it can get disorienting out here, especially if you’re not used to the wilderness. And there’s no moon yet to help guide you, so that goes double tonight.
“The binoculars I handed out back at the shop will do most of the work for you. It helps if you stay as still as possible as you’re watching the skies. And please, no playing jokes with camera flashes. You can temporarily blind someone.”
The twenty-somethings murmured amongst themselves, as if possibly plotting something, but I shot them a quelling look and they subsided.
“Remember,” I went on, “you’ll be able to tell the UFOs from other objects such as satellites or planes by their movements. UFOs are known to exhibit non-ballistic movement, which means they can stop suddenly, shoot off at odd angles, disappear altogether. Believe me, you’ll know when you see one.”
Again some sotto voce chattering, this time from everyone in the group except the two women I’d already pegged as serious UFO believers. They gripped their binoculars and looked around them as if they expected a couple of Greys to emerge from one of the manzanita bushes.
“Michael?” I called out, and he nodded.
“Follow me,” he said.
They fell into line behind him, not questioning him taking the lead even though I was the tour operator. Funny how everyone expected the Native American to be the trailblazer. I knew my way around here pretty well, but if I had Michael along, I sure as hell was going to put him in the lead. He could probably be dropped into one of these canyons blindfolded and still find his way out without breaking a sweat.
Lance took up the rear, one hand resting casually at his hip. I hoped to God he wasn’t carrying. Probably not — most likely, such a stance was second nature to him, even if he was unarmed. Still, it unnerved me a little. Or maybe it was just having him directly behind me, watching as I negotiated my way over the rough ground. At least I wasn’t wearing shorts. One particularly hot night, I tried that and came away with manzanita scratches all over my bare legs. Ever since, I’d worn jeans and hiking boots when conducting these tours, no matter how warm it might be.
The spot I usually chose for UFO watching out in Boynton was only about ten minutes off the road, so it wasn’t too long before Michael stopped on the little rise that was our destination. The other UFO tour operators knew this was my stake and didn’t intrude; there was certainly plenty of open ground around Sedona to choose from. True, not all of it was prime UFO-watching territory, but there weren’t so many of us that we had to worry about tripping over each other. Besides, I’d heard that Craig’s group was going up to Schnebly tonight, which was part of the reason I’d come out here.
“Okay, everyone,” I said. “Eyes to the skies. If you see something, call it out so the others can have a chance to look in that quadrant. It’s usually better if you decide in advance which part of the sky you’re going to watch so there isn’t too much overlap.”
A hurried convo among the participants followed these instructions, and then almost as one they strapped on the binoculars and swiveled their heads upward to view the heavens. I heard a few gasps and oohs and ahs. So many visitors to Sedona came from big cities, and they’d never before seen the glory of a desert sky at night.
Even after so many years, I wasn’t completely jaded, but I didn’t need the binoculars to see the constellations, and in fact preferred to keep them off. It was easier to go to a particular client if necessary when I wasn’t encumbered with the night-vision lenses. I stood off to one side and watched as they pointed upward and chattered and compared notes.
Something moved lazily overhead, a bright star I could see even with my naked eyes. I watched it for a few seconds, then realized Lance had come to stand next to me.
“Space station?” he asked.
“Think so. The time would be about right.” I kept my tone casual and tried not to think about how close he stood to me. His proximity probably had far more to do with not wanting to be overheard than because he was trying to create some sort of intimate moment. I knew better than that.
“A couple more weeks, and it’ll be time for the Perseids,” he remarked.
“Yeah, I know. I hate that.”
He arched an eyebrow.
“Oh, come on, Lance, you know what a pain those things are. Everyone thinks they’re seeing crashing UFOs. I should just close up shop that week and go to Vegas or something.”
“Didn’t know you gambled.”
“I don’t. I’m all about the buffets.”
He actually halfway grinned at that remark, white teeth flashing in the darkness. It was nice to see him without his ubiquitous mirrored sunglasses, the ones that made him look like a cop even when wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Then again, that was probably the whole reason he wore them in the first place.
Michael came up on the other side of us. “Nice group tonight.”
“Yes,” I responded, glad of his presence. It was somehow a lot easier to stay focused when Michael was around. “I was sort of shocked that I actually got a full booking. Things have been kind of sparse the past few weeks. Apparently, word’s gotten out that UFO watching this summer is not it’s all cracked up to be.”
“Hmm.” His gaze was fixed eastward, where a few flickers of lightning showed above the ridge that marked the edge of the Mogollon Plateau. A short time later, thunder rumbled toward us, and I heard one of the college-age girls gasp out loud.
“It’s miles off,” I called out to the group. “No worries. We might see some rain before dawn, though.”
That was how it worked out there. The storms came rumbling in from the Gulf of Mexico, hot and laden with moisture. When the rain finally did come, it was cool and refreshing, if short-lived. A lot of people disliked the monsoon flow, and the latter part of the summer tended to be the slowest because of visitors trying to avoid it, but I had always enjoyed the turbulent weather. Something in the storm clouds and the sudden, jagged flashes of lightning called out to me. Then again, I loved Sedona in all its seasons, whether the red rocks were crowned with thunderheads in August or tipped with snow in January.
“Hey!” one of the boys called out. Travis, I thought his name was, though I couldn’t remember for sure. “What’s that?”
Nine other heads swiveled upward to where he was pointing. I followed his gesture as well, although I didn’t really expect to see anything besides a low-flying plane. You got those out here, even at night; Sedona’s airport closed at dusk, but Prescott and Flagstaff weren’t that far off, and they had much longer hours of operation at their airports.
But the object skimming the ridge line to the west didn’t look like an airplane, or a helicopter. I’d seen that shape before, just once — only then the enormous triangular craft had shot almost directly upward at a speed no human-built craft could manage. This one, though, kept dropping lower, heading straight toward us like an old-style fighter plane coming in for a strafing run. A beam of white light shot out from underneath, illuminating a narrow band of scrub brush to almost daytime brightness.
“Take off your binoculars!” Lance shouted, bolting past me toward the group of sky-watchers, who didn’t have even enough time to become frightened, judging by their general air of confusion. “Down! Everybody down!”
I had never heard that note of command in his voice before, but even the boisterous college students recognized it for what it was and dropped to the dirt. The ship moved closer, and now I could feel the hair on my arms and along the back of my neck prickling, smell the tang of electricity in the air.
…that sensation you get during a thunderstorm when lightning’s about to strike. Like a smell of ozone….
Persephone’s words rang in my mind, and I wondered if that was what the psychic had meant.
Lance’s voice cracked like a whip. “Kara!”
I knew I should be moving, should be scuttling in the dirt along with the rest of the group, all of whom had taken shelter beside a nearby clump of manzanita. Something seemed to hold me in place, though, kept my boots rooted to the ground as if the sandy soil had become magnetized. My reply got stuck in my throat, like those times when I’d awakened with night terrors, trying to scream but finding no air to fuel my cries.
The beam of light moved closer. I knew it would be on me next, burning me with its white heat.
Must move….
But still my muscles wouldn’t obey my brain’s commands. The sand sent up little wisps of steam into the night air as the light traced its way to me. Was I the aliens’ target, or only collateral damage of some kind of probe?
Something hard hit me, forcing me to the ground, pushing me out of the path of the light beam. It was only after a dazed second that I realized it was Lance who had landed on me, who was sheltering me with his body. Past his shoulder, I saw something dark standing between me and Lance and the aliens’ beam, a tall shape that raised its arms as if warding off the probe.
Michael. It sounded as if he was chanting something, but between the earth-shaking hum emanating from the ship and the shrieks from the tour group, I couldn’t tell hear what he was saying. I wanted to scream at him to run, to move out of the way of the beam, but still my voice felt strangled in my throat…or maybe Lance had knocked the wind out of me when he pushed me out of harm’s way.
For a few seconds, the ship didn’t move. It hovered a hundred feet off the ground, beam stationary, as Michael stared up at it, arms still outstretched, the low monotone of his chant a counterpoint to the throbbing drone of the enormous vessel’s engines. Then the beam disappeared and the ship shot almost directly upward, disappearing into the night sky.
For a long while, no one moved. Finally, I felt Lance shift off me and climb to his feet. He brushed at the dusty knees of his jeans and shot an incongruous smile at the group of terrified tourists.
“Well, kids, looks like you just had your first close encounter.”