CHAPTER 15

GOOD MORNING,” said Rosemary just after eight A.M. Tuesday to a puffy-eyed Kim, who had appeared at the top of the basement steps, Tyler on her hip. “Were the two of you comfortable down there?”

“Hey, heater, light, sleeping bags, a sink and toilet—and safety. It was just lovely, and we both slept the whole night.”

“Kim, that’s good to hear. I need to go into town, but there’s all the usual breakfast stuff. And hot water for coffee,” she added. “You’ll just have to grind the beans.”

“I can do that.” Kim put Tyler down in the nearest chair and pushed it closer to the table.

“I was going to leave you a note. I need to take the piece I wrote about Mike Morgan, and Sabrina’s sketches, to Glenna Doty at the Courier office,” Rosemary said, and moved past Kim to the refrigerator.

“Is that Mike Morgan?” Kim followed, to look over Rosemary’s shoulder. “Huh. She was interesting-looking, kind of.”

“I think she was an interesting person,” Rosemary said as she took the sheet of paper down. “Anyway, after that I have some other errands to run. I think you know where everything is, just help yourself. I’ll be gone for a good two hours, maybe more.”

“If it’s okay with you,” Kim said, “I’ll just stay here and make a couple phone calls, try to figure out what to do next. Maybe you could leave the dog with us?”

Rosemary considered this for a moment. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. I have a certain amount of control over him, but I’m not sure he’d obey you. Or even be any protection for you; he’s pretty much a one-person animal. Just lock the doors if you feel frightened, and call the sheriff if Steve or someone like him turns up. This morning, I found the bell that used to be on my old gate and hung it over this new one. It should clang if anyone comes in.”

“God, I don’t know why I’m being such a wuss.” Kim straightened, and shook her hair back. “I just need to get myself awake and back in gear. A cup of your hundred-proof coffee ought to do the trick,” she added with an attempt at a grin. “If it does, I might walk up the hill later, see if there are any messages from Eddie on my phone.”

“Sounds like a plan. And if you do decide to go anywhere else, leave me a note.”

“JUST in time,” said Glenna Doty as Rosemary came in the door. “I’ll grab a quick look at what you’ve got there and then fire the whole thing off.”

Rosemary handed over the folded pages, Glenna glanced at them briefly and said, “Looks mostly okay. I’ll shape it up a bit on the machine and ship it off.”

What do you mean, mostly? Rosemary pulled the sheet of drawing paper from her case and held it out. “Can you use these?”

“What are they?” Glenna eyed the sketches. “Ah, Michelle Morgan. You draw these?”

Rosemary shook her head and explained. “And I called Sabrina at about seven A.M. this morning to ask if we could use them. I’m not sure she was really awake, but she gave her permission.”

“I think there’s room in this issue. I’ll scan ’em in and we’ll see. Thanks, Rosemary. I’m tight for time right now, but I’ll buy you a cup of coffee next time you come in. Or a glass of wine,” she added with a grin.

At almost nine-thirty, Rosemary was remembering that she’d had only coffee for breakfast. Maybe she was entitled to indulge herself at the Luna Bakery, which Mike Morgan had frequented. “You’ll have to wait in the car there, friend,” she told Tank as she climbed back into her truck. “However, there’s another stop I’d like to make first.”

The parking lot at the sheriff’s department was not crowded. She pulled into a space toward the end of the row, and was just issuing “Stay and be good!” orders to the dog when Sheriff Angstrom himself came out the front door and headed for the white sedan parked nearby.

“Hey, Rosemary. Can I do something for you?”

“I wasn’t going to bother you personally. I just came by to drop off a copy of the piece I wrote for the Courier about Ms. Morgan,” she told him, reaching into her bag.

“Tell you what. I’ve been here since six A.M., running on nothing but coffee. How about I buy you breakfast at the Pine Cone?”

Bacon, eggs, and hash-browns instead of pastries. “Sounds fine.”

“Good. Climb in,” he said, and reached for the door of his car.

“I have a passenger,” she told him, gesturing at the big yellow head framed in the window of her truck. “It might be better for me to meet you there.”

AT the Pine Cone Diner, a busy place on Main Street appealing both to locals and to those passing through on highway 299, Sheriff Angstrom was greeted warmly and shown to a booth toward the back of the big room. When coffee had been poured and meals ordered, Rosemary pulled another set of folded pages from her bag and handed them across. “This isn’t important from a law-enforcement point of view, but it’s a report of exchanges Michelle Morgan had with locals, and what they thought of her. If we ever locate her family, they might be pleased to know about these people.”

“Right, they probably would,” he said, still reading.

“Have you learned anything more about her, or what happened to her?” she asked when he’d set the pages aside.

“Only that Michelle Morgan was probably not her real name, no big surprise. Her social security number was a phony,” he said in response to Rosemary’s questioning glance.

“Can you just make up a social security number?”

“You can buy one, and it’s not hard if you have the right contacts. You’d get caught eventually, but it could take a while. I’d say she’d had hers for some time.”

“So we’re never going to find out who she really was?”

“Probably not. Sorry.”

The plates arrived, and Rosemary had an uneasy moment as she viewed the two over-easy eggs staring back at her like a pair of filmy yellow-and-white eyes. Then she caught the bacon smell, and noted that the potatoes were handsomely browned with plenty of onion, and her stomach cheered right up.

“So what’s been happening with you out there on Willow Lane? Any more anonymous phone calls or nasty little tricks?”

“A few calls, nothing really threatening. But as for nasty tricks?” She had a bite of bacon, wishing she’d sensibly avoided this meeting. “Sunday morning some hunter, I presume it was, dumped a load of deer offal in my front yard. And yesterday someone spray-painted ‘Flatlander go home’ on my nice new fence.”

He put his fork down and looked directly at her. “Think it might be the work of your bad-tempered neighbor? Maybe it’s time I had another little talk with Runyon.”

“I’ve talked with his wife and she’s convinced me Eddie was not the vandal.”

“Convinced you?” He sat straighter and looked ready to say more, but she didn’t give him time.

“Kim is a nice girl. She has a difficult two-year old, and she’s pregnant, not that I should have told you that. Anyway, Eddie’s away at the moment, and I’d hate to see her bothered. If there are any more nasty tricks, I’ll certainly report them.”

He blew out an irritated breath. “You’ve reported these, and I’ll make a note of them. And ask around. And probably talk to Runyon when he gets back.”

“Fine. This is a good breakfast; thank you.” She smiled at him, and after a moment, he smiled back and said, “You’re welcome.”

ROSEMARY stopped at the supermarket for a few items before leaving town. Kim had been on her own for more than two hours now, and might have decided what she wanted to do next, and where she wanted to do it. “And you and I need a real walk,” she said to Tank as she turned in the direction of home.

Some fifteen minutes later she came around the curve on Willow Lane, pulled up at her front gate, and decided to park there until she’d found what Kim’s circumstance was. She got out, went around the truck to let Tank out, and as she stepped through the gate, the front door of the house flew open and Kim appeared in the doorway, Tyler beside her.

“Kim? What’s up?” she called, and as she picked up her pace, Tank shot past her and into the house. “Tank, wait! Kim, what’s that noise?”

“Your vandal, I think.” Kim stopped to pick up Tyler, who had been knocked over by Tank and was setting up a howl. ”Hush! You’re not hurt.”

“My vandal?” Rosemary brushed past Kim into the house, where Tank’s barking could have waked the dead; but clearly whoever was behind the basement door he’d planted himself in front of was still alive, and vocal. “Tank, knock it off!” She grabbed his collar and tugged him away through the kitchen, into the living room.

“Sit!” she told him, and then, to Kim,” Tell!”

Kim lifted a hand to brush her hair back from her flushed face. “The one with the spray can.” She sat down on the couch, settling a still-sobbing Tyler beside her. “Shhh, it’s okay, baby.“

“So how did he get into the basement?” Rosemary perched on the edge of the nearest chair.

“She. I put her there.”

“Ahhh.” Rosemary was getting a glimmer here. “Tell me about it, Kim.”

“I was out in the backyard playing with Tyler, and I heard the bell on the gate. I was worried about who it might be, so I picked Tyler up and took him in the back door. Then I peeked out the front, and saw it wasn’t Steve, or Eddie either, but some skinny, frizzy-haired skank with a spray can in her hand. And for sure nobody I’d ever seen before.”

Rosemary sat back in the chair and let her shoulders relax. “So you, um, intercepted her?”

“I went out there and asked her what the hell she thought she was doing, and she went, ‘Fuck off bitch it’s none of your business,’ and pointed that spray can at me.Then when I grabbed it, she decided to try to hang on to it—too bad for her, because right now I really don’t feel like taking shit from anybody,” she added with a shrug. She had a developing bruise high on one cheekbone, Rosemary noted, and scratches on the back of her right hand.

“And you put her in the basement?”

“Seemed the best place. There’s not a whole lot of damage she can do down there, and those windows would be real hard to get out of. I put the paint can on the shelf in your coat closet.”

“Good. Thanks.” Rosemary did a mental inventory of her basement. Beyond whatever Kim had brought along in addition to sleeping bags, there wasn’t much that could be damaged without, say, an axe—which was stowed out in the shed. The guns were securely locked in the corner cupboard her brother Ben had built for just that purpose on his last visit. “Much as it embarrasses me to say so, I’d have loved to see that encounter. But you should put antibiotic ointment on those scratches. If our captive is my niece, Christabel, her nails are probably poisonous.”

“That’s your niece? Poor you.”

“I couldn’t agree more. In a while, I’ll decide what to do about her. For the moment, we should talk about?” She fell silent and cocked her head to listen to the racket: fists, presumably, pounding on the door, and shouts of the kind that you’d expect to hear in a street brawl. Rosemary got up and went into the back hall. “Be quiet, Christy,” she said loudly, “or I’ll call my friend the sheriff and tell him you were caught vandalizing my house.

“Or we could put the hose through the window and drown her,” she continued in the same voice to Kim from the kitchen. Then, in the living room and in her normal voice, “So. What shall we do about you? I probably won’t keep Christy in the basement for long, but it’s not an ideal place for you, either.”

“I finally decided to call my uncle Chuck in Red Bluff, and he said he’d get in touch with his shop right away and tell the guys to bring me out a truck. I just have to call them. And I can stay at his house if I want. But I think once I have wheels, I’d rather stay at home.”

“You haven’t heard from Eddie?”

She shook her head. “I walked up to the house right after you left. No messages, and the place was locked up, no sign anybody’d been in. I…honest to God, I’m worried that something bad might have happened to him. Like I told you, the few times he’s been away overnight he always called to talk to me, and Tyler,” she said with a glance at her son, who had settled into a fitful doze on the couch beside her. “He really loves Tyler.”

“As upset as he was when he drove away from here,” Rosemary said slowly, “he might have had an accident. Would you be willing now to call the sheriff’s people and ask them to look for him?”

“If he’s not home by tomorrow, then I will.” She used both hands to pull her hair back this time, and straightened her shoulders. “So, before I call Uncle Chuck’s shop, you want me to help you with your niece? I mean, do you feel like handling her all by yourself?”

“Tell you what. You go ahead and call the shop. Then, while we’re waiting, I’ll let Christy up and we’ll see how it goes. If she turns out to be too much for the two of us, we can trust that a couple of strong young guys will be on hand shortly.”

“Huh!” was Kim’s dismissive reply.

As Kim made her phone call, Rosemary got Tank’s short leash from the closet, pausing for a moment to inspect the paint-can. It bore dribbles of red paint that looked like a very good match to that now marring her fence.

“Okay. They’ll bring out Uncle Chuck’s Ford One-fifty, and figure to be here in thirty minutes, max. Let’s let the ugly niece up and see if solitary confinement did her any good.”

“It would be the first improvement in living memory.” Rosemary clipped the leash to Tank’s collar and moved to the basement door. “Christy? I’m unlocking the door. You may come up if you wish.” She turned the lock and quickly stepped well back, keeping a firm grip on the leash.

The door hit the wall as it burst open and a wild-eyed Christa-bel Mendes exploded into the back hall. “Listen here, you fucking old bitch, I’ll tear your head off for locking me down there!”

Tank, generally disposed to like women, made a quick judgment and voiced his disapproval of this one in a teeth-baring, snarling bark.

“Jesus, get him away from me! I don’t like dogs, get him away!”

“Rosemary didn’t lock you down there, I did. If you think you can tear my head off, you’re welcome to try again.” Kim, a sturdy five feet ten or so, looked eager for the contest.

“Go into the living room and sit down, Christy,” said Rosemary. “And we’ll discuss what I should do about you.”

“You have no right to do anything about me,” she sputtered, edging past the dog and then both women. “Just let me out of here.”

“Sit down!” Rosemary snapped, and Tank barked and a startled Christy dropped to the nearest chair to sit there bolt-upright and glaring.

“I didn’t do anything to you.”

“Or to my fence?”

“Or to your stupid fence.”

“We have the paint can, Christy. It’s been used, and it’s clearly the same red that has not yet been cleaned off my fence. I’m sure that my friend Sheriff Angstrom, when I give it to him, will be able to match the two.” Christy had her mouth open to protest, but Rosemary went on. “I’m also sure that the miracle of modern science can match your voice with the one on my answering machine.”

“So what? There’s no law against leaving messages on people’s machines.”

“And what about lying accusations on other answering machines and voice-mails around town? I think you’ll find that kind of thing constitutes both harassment and slander.” Rosemary had no idea whether this was true, but she felt that it certainly should be.

“That’s a load of fucking bullshit, you old—”

Kim, who’d been watching with arms folded and chin out, moved quickly forward. “You shut your filthy mouth. My little boy doesn’t have to listen to that kind of shit.”

As Christy shrank back, Rosemary suppressed an inappropriate urge to giggle. She was fairly sure that Tyler Runyon had heard worse right in his own home. “And under the harassment heading, what about the deer offal you dropped on my lawn?”

“Deer what?”

“Guts,” said Kim. “Did you have a tag to kill that deer?”

“I didn’t kill it. My boyfriend—I think he had a tag—he killed the deer, he’s a real good shot. Then he sold it to a guy that hadn’t had any luck, and helped him field-dress it. Anyway, I don’t see anything illegal about deer guts. I bet your dog loved them,” she added, making a face.

So he did, you nasty little wretch. “Which of you shot out the windshield of my truck?” asked Rosemary, and watched the sharp face go blank.

“Windshield? What’re you talking about? I don’t know anything about a windshield.”

With a quick sideways glance, Rosemary saw Kim’s shoulders slump. “Perhaps your boyfriend will remember,” she said to Christy. “Did he bring you here today? I didn’t see your red Miata anywhere out there.”

“How did you know about my car?” She sounded outraged at this invasion of her privacy.

“I’ve had good reason for keeping up on things in Arcata. Now, your boyfriend. Did he just drop you off and leave?”

“No! Well, not really. He, um, dropped me off, but he’ll come back later.” Her voice didn’t carry much conviction.

“I wouldn’t count on it,” said Kim. “He’d parked right in front of the gate, and when he heard me yell, he dived back into his truck and really laid rubber getting out of here. Must be fifty miles down Two-ninety-nine by now—in a white king-cab pickup with spot-lights,” she added. “Maybe a Dodge.”

“What’s his name, Christy? Is he from Arcata, too? Someone you talked into bringing you over here to make trouble?”

“None of your business!” she snapped, and then shrugged. “He’s a friend of Leo’s, and he was coming over here anyway to go deer hunting. And I’m going outside to wait for him.”

Any friend of Christy’s brother, Leo, would be someone worth avoiding. “Not just yet!” said Rosemary, and her tone brought Kim and Tank to attention. “We’re not through with this conversation. How long have you been in town?”

Christy eyed the distant door, and the alert dog, and rolled her eyes. “We got here Saturday. We’d been up north first, looking for deer.”

“And where have you been staying?”

“The first nights we slept in the back of the truck. Here, we got a room in this crummy little motel out on the highway east, to clean up.”

“So the two of you dumped the offal Saturday night, and came back on Monday to vandalize my fence.”

A shrug. “So you say.”

Tyler shifted and muttered in his sleep, and Kim went to bend over him and rub his back.

“So I do say. And today you were all ready again with the spray paint. Was that going to be it, or did you have something additional in mind? Did your grandmother, or your mother, send you over here on a mission?”

“Nobody tells me what to do! I just…everybody was talking about what a rotten person you are and how you’d cheated the family out of all that money. And how Gramma was making herself sick over it. So I made it my business to find out where you lived, and decided to come and, uh, tell you off. That was all.”

Kim got to her feet quickly, made a “just a minute” gesture to Rosemary, and went out the front door. Rosemary heard her foot-steps on the wooden porch, but didn’t hear, hadn’t heard, any engine noise.

“I’ll tell you this only once. That money was mine, from an insurance policy Jack and I had bought and paid for, and from the company whose errors caused his death. No one else in your family had a right to a penny of it. Kim?” she said, looking up as Kim appeared in the doorway. “Is your truck here?”

“Not yet. Rosemary, is this yours?” She held up a sturdy hatchet with a shiny, sharp-looking blade.

Rosemary got to her feet. “No. Where did you find it?”

“I halfway noticed it just inside the gate when I went after your vandal niece there. Best guess, she brought it with her. What do you suppose she planned to do with an axe?”

Christy shrank back in her chair. “I didn’t! Jerry had it in his truck, and when we stopped, he got out with it and I thought he was going to put it in the back. But he set it down inside the gate.… ” She paused to draw a long breath. “And then she came screaming out and grabbed me and he took off and I forgot about it. I wouldn’t have done anything with it! honest to god, Aunt Rosemary, I wouldn’t have!”

Kim’s snort of disgust was followed by a muffled cry from Tyler. She handed the hatchet to Rosemary and moved to pick her son up, cradling him against her shoulder. “It’s okay, little kid. Not your problem.”

Rosemary moved to the door to set the thing outside and saw a late-model gray pickup pull up out front, followed by a larger white rig with an Acme Auto Body logo on its door. “Kim, your ride is here. And you stay right where you are,” she said to Christy.

————

“LOOK, Uncle Chuck even had them get a baby-seat for me,” Kim said fifteen minutes later, the last of her belongings now stowed in the truck.

“He’s a thoughtful man,” said Rosemary as Kim took Tyler from her to slide him into the seat and buckle him in.

“He is. Rosemary, I don’t like leaving you here with that skanky bitch. You sure you wouldn’t like me to stay? Or call the sheriff?”

“You go home and get Tyler settled.” She reached up to give the younger woman a hug. “Call me within, oh, thirty minutes. If you don’t get an answer, you can call the sheriff.”

“You sure?”

“Don’t worry, she’s scared. And she’s no match for Tank and me.”

“Okay, but what if that boyfriend turns up? Chances are he’s a nutter or a loser or both.”

“Good point. I’ll find out a bit more about him and call the sheriff myself.”

“Let me know what happens.”

CHRISTY sat right where Rosemary had left her, chewing at the skin beside a fingernail. “Hey, I was gonna go get a drink of water or something, but your dog looked at me.”

“He does that,” said Rosemary. “Tank, be good. Christy, what motel were you staying at?”

“Bluebird Cabins. Right on the highway.”

Rosemary collected the phone from her desk and handed it to the girl. “Why don’t you call the place, to find out if Jerry’s there.”

“I don’t know the number.”

“I can find it,” said Rosemary, directory in hand. She read the number out and Christy, with a grimace, punched the phone buttons, waited, spoke in a flat voice. “This is Christabel Mendes, staying with Jerry Maldonado in cabin fifteen. Do you know if he’s there?”

She listened to a voice Rosemary couldn’t hear, made another face and hung up. “He checked out, the son of a bitch. He left my bag in the office. Now what am I gonna do?” she finished in a wail.

“I’m afraid that’s not my problem. I don’t think there’s a regular bus to the coast, but maybe you can catch a ride.”

“You’re my aunt, for chrissakes! You’re family, you can’t just leave me out on the road!”

“Christy, get this. I am no family of yours. You’d better call your mother, or one of your brothers.”

“Sure, like they’d bother. Listen, if Uncle Jack was here, I bet he’d drive me home.”

Rosemary clenched her hands together to keep from wrapping them around Christabel Mendes’s narrow neck.

“Well?” Christy demanded.

Rosemary set fantasy aside and closed her eyes for a moment.

“He was the only good guy in the family, and you and Ben and Paul were really lucky to have him. Ben and Paul, I really hated those guys when I was a kid.”

“Give me the telephone.” She held it out, and Rosemary took it to her desk and sat down. “Do you know the license number of Jerry Maldonado’s truck?”

“Uh, no. Why?”

“What make is it?”

“Like she said, a Dodge. I think two years old. Why?”

“I’m going to call the sheriff’s department and ask them to keep an eye out for that truck.”

“You can’t do that! He’ll be really mad at me!”

“Tough.” Rosemary made the call, asked to speak to Sheriff Angstrom, and was lucky enough to find him available.

“Gus, this is Rosemary Mendes. I have my niece here, the source of the vandalism and the calls. No, no, it’s fine,” she went on quickly. “So far, at least. Her name is Christabel Mendes and she’s disarmed.”

Loud rattle of words from the phone, and Rosemary said, “Sorry, bad choice of words. She has no weapon at the moment except an evil eye. Very evil,” she added in response to Christy’s glare. “However, her boyfriend was here earlier, with a sharp little axe and possibly bad intentions. His name is Jerry Maldonado, from Arcata or the vicinity. He’s presently driving a white two-year-old Dodge king-cab with spotlights. I don’t know the number, but until a short while ago he was staying at the Bluebird Cabins under his own name. Right, that occurred to me.”

Rosemary listened for a few moments more, said, “Yes,” several times, and “I understand,” once, agreed to keep in touch, and put the phone back in its cradle.

“He’ll kill me,” Christy moaned when she’d hung up. “And if he doesn’t, Leo will.”

“Be quiet, Christy. I have some thinking to do. Go into the kitchen and get yourself something to eat, a beer, whatever.”

“Hey, I’m not old enough to drink!”

“So drink milk. Just go away for a few minutes. And leave that telephone where it is.”

Muttering something under her breath, she slunk off to the kitchen and Rosemary made some notes and two phone calls. When she’d finished, she went to the kitchen to find that Christy had discovered the remains of the pea soup Kim had brought with her the day before, heated it in Rosemary’s microwave, and was seated at the table with a bowl of soup and an open bottle of ale. Tank sat beside the table, watching her hopefully.

“Your dog isn’t so tough now. I think he likes me.”

“He likes food. And if you make any kind of threatening move in my direction, you’ll find out how much he likes you.” After her unusually large breakfast, Rosemary wasn’t hungry. She opened a bottle of ale for herself, tossed a few bits of kibble to Tank, and sat down across from her uninvited guest.

“I’ve decided it’s time to make perfectly clear to the rest of your family just where I stand.”

“You’re going to give them the money?”

“Don’t be silly. When you’ve finished eating, I’ll drive you into town to the Bluebird Cabins and see that you get a room for the night.”

“Can’t I stay here?”

“Then, tomorrow, I’ll drive to Arcata, deliver you home, and collect my attorney.”

“Oh. Him.”

“Yes, him. And take him, and the neighbor who helped me after your Uncle Fred attacked me, to talk to the rest of ‘the family’ about what’s going to happen if they don’t agree to leave me alone.”

Christy’s eyes narrowed and her sharp jaw jutted further. “Uncle Fred. That old bastard.”

Rosemary kept her gaze steady and her mouth shut, and after a moment, Christy shrugged. “He was just this kind of boring old guy, until I turned twelve and started getting boobs, which is when he started looking at me a lot. One day he came to our house when nobody else was home and grinned this spitty grin and went, ‘My you’re getting to be a real pretty young lady I have something here I bet you’d love to see.’ And he unzipped and whipped out this ugly little dick.”

Rosemary waited, briefly. “What did you do?”

“Gave him a soccer kick right in the balls. And told him that if he ever tried anything like that again, I’d tell Uncle Jack.” Another shrug. “He never bothered me after that. So what did you do?”

“Hit him with a baseball bat.”

“Wow! Good for you!”

Probably she shouldn’t be telling a nineteen-year-old girl the story she’d told no one else but her neighbor, and her lawyer. “Your uncle had made himself very useful right after Jack’s death, and at first I was grateful,” Rosemary said. “Then, when Ben and Paul were gone, and I’d returned from my month away, he was on the doorstep almost every day wanting to run errands, insisting on doing house-hold chores. Paying me compliments, giving me little gifts, asking me out to dinner.”

Christy held her silence in turn, and Rosemary had a swallow of ale. “I tried to keep fending him off with polite excuses and make clear that I wasn’t in the market for another man. ‘Thank you, but I’m busy. I appreciate your help but I’ve hired a neighbor boy for yard work. I appreciate your offer, but I like to do my own grocery shopping.’” She sighed at the memory, and her listener snorted.

“You were a wimp.”

“True.” She sat forward in her chair and wrapped both hands around the ale bottle, focusing her gaze on the label. “I really thought I’d convinced him I wasn’t interested. Then one night, I came home from a late dinner with some women friends. I locked the door, turned out the lights, went up to my bedroom and was undressing for bed when he leaped out of the closet, naked, and jumped me.”

Christy took an audible breath and held it.

“All alone in that big house, and sleeping badly, I’d been keeping Paul’s baseball bat beside my bed.” Rosemary’s throat tightened, and she coughed to clear it. “He hit me several times trying to hold me down, but I finally got hold of the bat and twisted out from under him. And swung at whatever part of him I could reach.”

“But you got away.” It wasn’t a question.

“He’s not very big, and I was?very, very angry.” The chill of remembered terror was fading before the memory of how she’d felt when that bat connected. “He was trying to run backwards, and yelling, trying to hide behind his arms. And he hit the window and crashed through onto the porch roof and slid down and ran away, I didn’t see that, but my neighbor did.

“Mattie O’Neill, next door,” Rosemary added. “She’s eighty years old and was often up at night, and she heard the noise and came to see what was happening.”

“You didn’t call the cops?”

She shook her head. “Mattie insisted on taking some photos, and went with me next day to see my attorney. But I didn’t want Ben and Paul to disrupt their lives, maybe spoil their lives, over something I’d survived with no more damage than a few bruises. And they would have, they’d have come roaring to the rescue like knights on white horses.”

“So, are you going to the cops now?”

“That depends mostly on what my attorney says about it, and what your family can do to convince me that they’ll leave me alone.” She picked up her bottle of ale for a swallow that drained the bottle, and Christy did the same.

The telephone broke the silence, and the tension. Rosemary got up to answer it, while the girl took her dishes to the sink.

“Christy?”

The faucet was turned off and Christy came into the living room, to find Rosemary just replacing the phone. “Sheriff Angstrom will come by this evening to talk to you, so now might be a good time to go to town to get your bag.”

“Sheriff? I don’t want to talk to the sheriff, I haven’t done anything.”

Rosemary just looked at her, and she flushed. “Well, not much of anything. Nothing that hurt anybody.”

“Your intentions could certainly be open to interpretation. However, the sheriff also said he thinks it would be a good idea for me to keep you here with me for tonight.”

After a long moment, Christy said, “Yeah, okay. Thanks.”

“Then we’re all agreed. If you’re ready, we’ll go by Kim’s house first. I want to tell her I’ll be away for a day, or maybe two, and give her a key.”

 

1992

A CLOUD of dust billowed around the pickup truck as it swung off the road to stop before a wide gateway; on the arch above it, the cut-out of a horse reared beneath the words CONROY RANCH in black iron letters. Beyond the metal bars of the gate, a drive paved in white crushed rock made a curving sweep to a sprawling glass-and-cedar building.

The pickup’s driver, a lanky youth with a blond ponytail and a sparse goatee, peered up at the big red-and-blue-on-white sign suspended from the arch: RE-ELECT STATE SENATOR CONROY. “Well shit, another rich politician. You work here?”

“I hope to. It’s a working quarter-horse ranch, and my boyfriend’s a trainer.” Brianna Conroy slid from the passenger seat, closed the door, and strode to the rear of the truck to heft a duffel bag from the bed. In worn Levi’s, chambray shirt, and slant-heeled, pointy-toed Western boots, she was over six feet tall and so slim as to look even taller. “Thanks for the ride. Maybe see you around.”

He sketched a salute and drove off. Brianna stopped short of the gate to toss the bag over; then she slipped sideways through the gap between post and gate, picked up her bag, and set off up the drive.

The front door opened before she’d reached the trellised terrace that served as entryway, and her father came down the steps, pleasure and irritation mingled in his expression. “Brianna, what are you doing here? I thought graduation was day after tomorrow.”

“Hi, daddy. I decided to pass on the caps-and-gowns deal and caught a ride.” Nearly his equal in height, she returned his hug briefly before stepping free. “What’ve you got to eat? I’m starved.”

“It’s Mrs. Garcia’s day off, but the fridge is full.” He picked up her bag and led the way through foyer, great room, and a big dining room where the table was stacked with brochures, into the kitchen. “Where’s the rest of your stuff?”

“That’s it.” She opened the right-hand door of the stainless steel fridge, fished out a brown bottle with a colorful label, found an opener in a nearby drawer. “I gave all those plaid skirts and blouses and sweaters and sissy shoes to St. Vincent de Paul.” She tipped the bottle for a long swallow before returning to the fridge. “Oho. Homemade enchiladas!”

“Brianna…”

She set the bottle and a big covered platter on the nearby table and bent to her duffel bag, to unzip an end pocket. “Here,” she said, and handed him a leather-covered folder. “Certificate of honorable graduation from St. Ursula’s Academy. All yours. The grades will come in the mail later.”

He glanced at the diploma and set it on the table. “I’ve seen the grades, and they reminded me that with your record, and your SATs, it was a mistake not to insist that you apply to Stanford.”

“Eeew. Besides, I bet they don’t let you bring your horse to Palo Alto.” Brianna scooped two enchiladas onto a plate, covered the plate with plastic wrap, and put it in the microwave oven. She punched buttons and then turned to look at her silent father. “Wha-at?”

At fifty-eight, Conroy was big without being bulky, still flat-bellied and straight-backed. His eyes were blue, his skin tanned and weathered, his silvered brown hair cut full enough to carry a slight wave. Now he nodded, as if he’d settled a question. “You can relax for a couple of days, help out with the mail. Then on Saturday dave will fly you and Sammie to San Francisco. You have an appointment at a hair salon she recommends, and then the two of you will shop for some suitable clothes.”

“Uh-uh. Nope.” She picked up the bottle of ale for another swallow. “I am not wearing anything but boots and Levi’s for the next three months, until I leave for college.”

“Bree, I need you as hostess here.” Conroy pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. “For the campaign. The election is in November.”

“You had an easy win last time. You’ll do it again.” The oven beeped, and Brianna collected the plate and carried it to the table, to sit down across from him.

“This will be my second term, and since we have term limits now, my last. I need a big victory margin, and lots of publicity, because next time I’m aiming higher, like Congress.” He paused for a moment, as if savoring the thought. “And as a widower, I’ll benefit from having my beautiful, charming daughter—which you are, when you make the effort—at my side, to let the world see that I’m really a family man.”

“What happened to Tiffany?”

“Tiffany?”

Brianna paused to savor a forkful of enchilada. “God these are good. I never remember the names; she was, like, Tiffany Three, I think. The one you had with you at Tahoe over Christmas. She said you were going to get married.”

“Her name is Dany—Danielle,” he said stiffly. “We were just good friends, and still are. If she thought otherwise, she simply misunderstood.”

“Hey, why not shape her up instead of me? I can recommend a doctor who’s great at boob reduction. There was this girl at school hauling around these humongous double-Ds like Tiffany—sorry, Dany—and she was really happy with what he did for her.”

“Brianna.” Conroy leaned forward and reached across the table to take her hand. “Please, baby. I really need you. And you might learn a lot. The world is changing, and there’s a lot of room for smart, independent women in politics now.”

She looked up at him, looked down at their linked hands, and pulled hers free. “Daddy, why don’t you marry Sammie? She runs your whole life already, she’s tough as nails, she’s fairly cool-looking. And if she was your wife, you wouldn’t have to pay her those big bucks.”

“Brianna, I had two wives die on me; I’m not willing to go through that again. Besides, Sammie has no interest in marrying me or anybody else.”

“Really? Is she lesbo?”

“No, she’s not. Not that it would be any of your business, or mine. So I don’t have and don’t want a wife, but I have a perfectly good, personable daughter, and I think she owes me some of her time.”

She shook her head. “Sorry, I have a job.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m working for this outfit over by Happy Camp. Sort of a dude ranch for people with some experience, long trail rides and camping out in the Siskiyous. I’ll mostly handle the horses. I start next week, and I told the boss I’d work until a week before I leave for college.”

“You’ll just have to call and cancel. I need you here.”

She shook her head and smiled. “Sunday’s my birthday, remember? I’ll be eighteen. I can do whatever I want.”

Conroy sat back and crossed his arms on his chest. “Here are some hard facts, Brianna. Money is short. In addition to the expenses of this election, and the condo in Sacramento, I’ve been doing a lot of traveling to DC and other places—and I expect to do more. If I have to hire someone for work I’d expected you to do, I’m not sure I can come up with out-of-state fees in September.”

“Daddy! I’ve been accepted at the U of A, where I’ve always wanted to go!”

“Well, you might just have to start out at Chico State.”

“No!” Brianna dropped her fork and shoved her plate away. “I’m going to Tucson. I’ll use my own money, the money Gran left me.”

Conroy shook his head. “You can’t touch that till you’re twenty-one.”

“That’s just bullshit, you could…” She read his face, and her shoulders slumped.

“Come on, baby.” He sprang to his feet and came around the table, to put an arm around her and pull her close. “I need you here. I’ve missed you, hardly seen you all year. We’ll have a good time working together over the summer, and then I’m sure I’ll be able to find the money for Tucson in September. Okay?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Good.” As he released her and straightened, he caught sight of the figure in the doorway. “Ah, good timing. Come on in, Dave, and have an enchilada and a beer with your sister, the graduate. I have a meeting in town.”

“Sit down, sit down,” snapped Brianna as B.D. disappeared towards the front of the house. “Here’s your beer,” and she popped the top off a bottle and set it down hard on the table. “And I’ll get you some—”

“Brianna, cool it and sit down. I know where the enchiladas are.”

“I can’t sit down, I’m too damn pissed.” But she dropped into a chair and watched glumly as he served himself. “I had a good job set up for the summer,” she went on, “in the mountains with horses. And he says I can’t do it, I have to work with him.”

“I heard all that.” When the microwave oven pinged, he brought his plate to the table and sat down across from her.

“If he needs a ‘family man’ setting, he should just marry Sammie. But he says he doesn’t want to, and she doesn’t, either. What I want to know is, why the hell not?”

“Sammie doesn’t have the—the presence—to pull off being right out there on the stage. But she loves her role as the power behind the throne, and she’s extremely good at it.” He tipped the bottle of ale up for a long draught, then dug into his enchilada.

Brianna reached for her own bottle, still half-full. “I hate politics, and I don’t have presence either.”

“Yeah you do,” he told her. “Or you will. You’re just like your mother.”

“I hardly even remember her.”

“I do. And so does B.D. But beyond all that, you’re his daughter and he loves you and he wants your help.”

She finished her ale in two swallows. “Okay. For a while. But not forever.”