by Nya Rawlyns
Marcus asked the question Josh avoided. “Why’d you want to leave the valley?”
“I didn’t.” At Marcus' disbelieving look, he hastened to explain. “That’s true. I love it here. It’s home. It’s all I ever knew. But...”
“But what?”
The hard part was putting into words something he wasn’t terribly proud of. Finally he said, “I got tired of seeing Ma and Pa getting old on hard times and worry, of seeing Becca with all the smarts I never had and knowing she’d end up like all the other gals around these parts. Married to a life that can suck you dry. Weighed down by a future that’s anything but bright.”
“Did you think leaving would make it better for them, easier?”
“Maybe.”
He glanced in the rearview mirror. Movement behind the truck as a group of teens scuffled and shoved each other caught his attention, as did his own reflection. Becca called it his sullen eyes, like when he was closing down, shutting out what he didn’t want to deal with. It wasn’t fair, to her or to Marcus, for him to be the sumbitch with the pouts and drama all the damn time.
Finally he took a deep breath and continued, “Mostly I just wanted out because if I didn’t see it happening, it didn’t have anything to do with me. I was being selfish. And it took me too damn long to figure that out.”
Marcus ran a finger along the line of Josh’s jaw, stopping at the first ridge of scarring. “Was this your wake up call, cowboy?”
Before Josh could respond, the sounds of shouting and glass breaking had them whipping around to stare out the rear window. He muttered, “Shit,” and shouldered his door open, swearing a blue streak as he tried to force his stiff leg to move.
Marcus was already on the ground, yelling, “You know any of them, Josh?”
Limping as fast as he could, he joined Marcus and they made tracks toward the fight centering around the preacher’s SUV. The driver side window had been shattered. Glass was everywhere as two boys Josh didn’t know took on John Barnes’ boy, Will, while another stood by, jeering and egging them on. Petilune was in the front seat, face buried in her hands, wailing a blue streak.
Marcus grunted, “What the hell? Petilune?”
Josh waded into the melee, picking up the nearest kid and tossing him over the hood of the SUV. He let Marcus tend to Will who was bleeding like a stuck pig with a broken nose and cuts on his hands and face. He could sense the one behind him circling like a vulture. The telltale snick of a switchblade close to his ear had him planting his feet and using his elbow in a sharp uppercut. He connected, enough to slow him down but not well enough to put the shithead on the ground. By the time he moved to contain the other one, they were ducking and dodging around the parked vehicles. Spinning wheels and spraying gravel at the far end put the tally at possibly four of them, one driving.
Marcus asked, “You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. How’s Will doing?”
“He’ll live.” They watched as people came running, alerted to the fracas. “Can you deal with them? I need to get Petilune away from here before she has a meltdown.”
Josh reminded him, “We’ll need a statement from her when she calms down. Why don’t you take her to your place? I’ll come by in a bit and we can find out from her what the hell this was about.”
Marcus picked up the hysterical girl and carried her carefully to his van. Josh watched them disappear from view before helping Will to his feet. His dad came running, shouting, “God damn it, boy, how many times I gotta tell you...”
Josh grabbed the man before he could light into the kid. “This ain’t his doing, John. How about you get him to the clinic and make sure he ain’t got glass where it don’t belong. I’ll be along when I can to take a statement.”
Josh had to bury the grin. Old habits died hard. As the mob clustered around, he fielded questions, directed the town’s mechanic to see about getting the SUV to a garage before the skies opened up, and assigned Polly to call the state cops. He decided not to mention Petilune being in the SUV until he talked with the boy first. The situation was on the fraught side, and it served no purpose to be putting ideas in peoples’ heads without knowing all the facts ahead of time.
As it was, the girl’s mother and brothers were conspicuously absent. Mercifully Marcus was taking responsibility for the youngster. She was in safe hands with him.
While he waited for the cops to arrive, Josh searched the area for clues as to what might have instigated the fight. He remembered spying a small group pushing and shoving, but it had looked like normal hijinks, not a serious prelude to a brawl. It hadn’t been enough to put him on alert.
On his last pass, as the state cops pulled in front of the restaurant, Josh noticed a teenager he’d seen inside at the start of the service. He was on the back porch, hands in his pockets, watching.
Josh tried committing the kid’s face to memory but he was too far away to get details. Patting his pocket for a notebook and pencil, Josh grimaced in irritation. Old habits didn’t mean shit if you didn’t carry the tools of the trade with you.
As the two officers approached, Josh settled in for a long afternoon.
Chapter Five
Interrogations
When Josh pulled up behind the loading dock, Marcus was tempted to leap off the cement slab and hug him. He quickly extinguished the one vice he’d been desperate to kick. Most days he got by without lighting up. This wasn’t one of them.
Fully expecting Josh to sneer or make a remark about smoking being bad for his health, he jammed the pack of cigarettes into his pocket, but Josh waggled his fingers and said, “I’ll take one of those, if you don’t mind.”
Josh mounted the steps, his movements stiff and sluggish. When he joined Marcus, he accepted the cigarette and the light.
Marcus asked, “Everything okay back at Polly’s?”
He’d been pacing frantically, waiting for Josh and for whatever illumination he could shed on the strange sequence of events in the parking lot. He’d hustled Petilune away before knowing how it had all played out. Now that Josh was there, his back braced against the wall, the smoke curling from his nose and mouth, all Marcus felt was relief.
Josh stretched his neck side-to-side, the popping noise loud in the still evening air. He grimaced and said, “It’s as good as can be for now. The state cops will call in somebody from Laramie to look into it.” At Marcus’ raised eyebrows, Josh explained, “Seems like this ain’t the only incident of random attacks.”
“What about the Barnes kid, he gonna be all right?”
“Yeah, his dad hauled him off to the clinic. Broken nose. Cuts from rolling on the ground where the glass was. Bruised ribs. Kid’s a linebacker on the football team so he can take some punishment.”
“Did you get to talk to him?”
Josh inhaled, then flicked the stub over the edge of the dock. He looked annoyed. “No. I was on my way to their place, but Sorenson stopped me.”
“Why?”
The question made Josh squirm. He took his time answering, as if there was something going on that wasn’t Marcus’ business, but when the man spoke he seemed casual enough.
“Ted and I go back. We were in community college together, graduated same time. He, uh, knows my history.”
“And that gives him the right to stop you... how?” Marcus felt his tail feathers ruffle. He wasn’t sure what Josh meant by being stopped, but irrationally he jumped to the conclusion that the cop had put up keep out, only professionals allowed at this crime scene tape... virtually speaking.
Grinning, Josh said, “He ain’t wrong, Marcus. Last I looked, I wasn’t wearing a badge, so me interviewing a witness? Not happening.” There was a glint in Josh’s eye that told Marcus it wasn’t going to be the end of the matter.
Taking a chance that Josh trusted him enough to share his thoughts, Marcus asked, “So, what’s the plan?”
“Well, since I’m not able to do anything in an official capacity don’t mean a concerned citizen can’t st
op by and inquire after the health of a friend’s kid who happened to get the crap beat out of him.”
“Would that concerned citizen like some company when he visits?”
That was a stab in the dark. Marcus held his breath as the tall man considered the idea, then exhaled when Josh asked, “You any good at remembering stuff?”
“You mean am I senile yet or just having the occasional senior moment?”
Barking a laugh, Josh said, “Concerned citizens don’t come round poking sticks at wasp nests and writing stuff down. Might give folks the wrong impression. Besides, some days I can’t remember what I had for breakfast. I could use an extra set of eyes and ears.”
Marcus took that as a yes. “Sounds good. Maybe we could practice on Petilune? She’s upstairs sleeping on the couch.” Ruefully Marcus added, “All I got out of her was a shitload of snot on my shirt sleeve and a headache. Dear Lord, that child can out-wail a fire siren.”
“Before we go in, do you mind running through how you saw it go down? After a couple hours with the staties doing due diligence, I’m clear enough on what I know. Or at least what I think I know.”
Coming from anyone else, it might have sounded like Josh questioned his reliability as a witness, but Marcus realized that grilling Petilune was going to present some special challenges. They needed to have their ducks in a row and not have them confusing the girl any more than she already was. The fact the poor kid couldn’t string two coherent words together didn’t bode well for her being able to enlighten them on what had happened. It was the main reason he’d done nothing more than hold her and mutter the usual there-there, you’re safe, don’t worry, honey pablum.
Tired of standing, Marcus slid down the wall and crouched on his heels. Rocking back and forth, he took a few seconds to organize what he’d seen—beginning with them in Josh’s truck, their hands almost touching, and how it had felt to be privy to a man’s confessions, to how an accident had changed everything for him. How he’d taken his misfortune and turned it around, turned himself around.
But mostly Marcus remembered the hand so close to his own it had taken an act of will not to grip it. It would have been a simple matter of compassion—of just being sympathetic and understanding—showing it that way instead of a pat on the shoulder or the arm, like men would sometimes do. Except, the words, the admission of what Josh saw as a huge character flaw, had lit Marcus from the inside, making him feel for someone else for the first time in years.
A wash of regret followed the initial relief he hadn’t given himself away so completely. The last thing on this earth he wanted was to alienate the man he was building trust with. That in the space of a few hours they’d moved from being passing acquaintances to friends, and now potential partners in a shared adventure, was enough. It had to be.
Shaking himself from his musings, Marcus said, “Okay, we heard the window break. Sounds of a fight a couple rows over from where you’d parked. Two guys were hammering on Will. There was another one hanging back.”
“Describe them.”
“Older teens, maybe in their early twenties. Didn’t know them so they probably aren’t from around here.”
Josh persisted. “Tell me what they looked like.”
Closing his eyes, Marcus thought back to earlier that day. What had he seen, who had he been looking at? He spoke hesitantly, trying to recall details but coming up with mostly vague impressions. It had all happened so fast he couldn’t be sure of what he saw.
“Um, the one who sticks out was the kid standing next to the reverend’s SUV. Seemed to me he was the instigator, the one telling the other two what to do. He was my size, maybe an inch shorter. Buzz cut. Might’ve been blond or light brown. Hard to tell when it’s scalped like that.”
Josh wasn’t able to slide down the wall into a semi-sitting position without making a major project out of it. He stood close to Marcus, his right foot braced against the wood siding. It would have been useful to get a read on whether or not what he recalled was what Josh had also seen.
Josh asked, “Eye color, anything else?”
“Can’t say I got that close to notice. Once I caught sight of Petilune in the car, I worried about what was going to happen to her.” He paused to consider if there was anything else that struck him. “Mostly they struck me as city types, scrappy, with chips on their shoulders.”
Josh sucked air above him. “Reason I’m asking is I didn’t have time to pay attention to him. I wanted to get the other two off Will before they did any more damage.”
“That was a nice toss, cowboy. That kid’s gonna be sore for a few days.”
“Tough. He was the one going for the kidney shot with his shitkickers.” He swore under his breath. “I been away from the job so long I’m losing my touch. Not so long ago I’d have had enough to make a sketch artist’s job a piece of cake. Now I’m struggling to pull up even the most obvious stuff.”
Marcus held his hand out for Josh to pull him up, both of them grunting with the effort. They grinned at each other ruefully. As Marcus stretched his legs pacing the short length of dock, he did some thinking out loud.
“Seems to me they can’t be complete strangers to the area. I know I haven’t seen them, but that don’t mean much considering I’m mostly in the store six days a week. Only time I get out is for church, like today, or if I get a hankering for Polly’s cooking on a Sunday afternoon. Question is, why are they here, and what the hell were they doing taking on a big kid like Will Barnes practically in view of the whole damn town?”
“You think they wanted to be seen?” Josh was staring at Marcus intently.
“I think they wanted to make a statement. What I’m not sure about is who that statement was for.”
“So we got us some troublemakers, maybe up from Laramie or Rawlins. They’re Caucasian, mid-teens, all of ’em five-nine to five-eleven, short hair.”
With Josh prodding him, details he’d never think to notice under normal circumstances came flooding back. “All three wore jeans. Baggy like the kind you see pictures of in the cities, with the stupid big side pockets and hems rolled at the ankles. Gangsta shit. Tee shirts. No logos.”
The style of jeans might be significant. Any guy worth his salt wore Wranglers that fit but left room for sitting a horse comfortably. Anything too tight was asking for trouble, and too loose was equally risky. To sport baggy jeans in ranch country pinned the wearer as an outsider, and a foolish one at that.
Josh asked, “How about jewelry? Earrings. The one I tossed had a stud in his right ear. Looked like an animal head, maybe stainless steel or nickel. The other one had a tat on his bicep but the tee-shirt kinda covered all but the edge.”
Marcus shut his eyes again, visualizing how he’d seen the girl in the passenger seat, her hands covering her eyes, screaming bloody murder. He’d registered a body hurtling past to land with a solid thunk on the hard-packed sandy surface. The rest of the action unreeled behind his eyes in slow motion.
Will was on the ground, curled into a ball, protecting himself as best he could. He’d crouched to check on the boy, keeping an eye on the one who was moving toward Josh. He’d tried to find enough spit to shout a warning to Josh that the leader had a knife. The asshole reached up as Josh’s elbow made contact under the kid’s chin, the sound of teeth and jaw crunching together loud as a gunshot. He wondered if the ex-MP had connected hard enough to break the kid’s jaw or to loosen some teeth.
Then it was over and the entire town seemed to converge on that spot. He’d grabbed Petilune and carried her to safety. Now, here he was, with Josh, pawing through vague recollections but no closer to an explanation for who, let alone why.
Marcus wondered aloud, “I’ve been mulling over if there was a reason for them to be at the reverend’s vehicle. And how the hell did Petilune get inside?” Even in a town like Centurion, where everybody knew everybody, you still locked your car doors. He slapped his thigh. “Why the hell was she even there with Will? He’s got a steady girl. It
’s not like him...”
Josh interrupted. “I don’t think she was with Will.”
“How so?”
“That date, last night. Remember that? She said it wasn’t anybody we’d know. What if it was one of those assholes?”
Marcus thought there was merit in that. “You might be right. Just before the service, Pet was clingy, made a big deal about me sitting with her and the family.”
“She usually do that?”
“Nope. First time.”
Marcus chewed his lower lip, trying to recall if the girl had said anything at all about her first date. The y’all don’t know him date. If she said anything at all, he’d been too distracted by the reverend, then by Josh, to pay much attention. His cheeks flared.
Damn. I am so pathetic.
Josh asked, “Did you notice a kid hanging around, dark hair and eyes? Wore a braid hung halfway down his back. We don’t usually get anyone coming this far south from the rez, but now and then...”
“Yeah, as a matter of fact, I saw him just when we sat down before the service started. He was staring at Petilune. I don’t think she saw him, though.”
“I spied him just before the cops arrived. He was on the porch. Just watching. I have no idea where he got to after that. He certainly wasn’t one of the group being questioned.”
Marcus noticed the back door was open. He must have forgotten to shut it when he came out to await Josh’s arrival. He said, “I don’t know about you, but all I’ve got is a boatload of more questions.”
“I agree. How about we wake Petilune up and see if she can fill in some of the blanks.” He went through the door first, then stopped in his tracks. “You always leave the emergency exit door wide open?”
“Shit, no.”
Marcus barged past the bigger man and flicked on the overhead lights in the store. They sizzled and zigged, buzzing into a brightness that was harsh and disorienting after being in near darkness for so long. Rushing up and down the narrow aisles, Marcus gave the shelves and standing stock the once over, but nothing seemed out of place or disturbed from the usual chaotic mess.