The Ties That Bind

by Andi Marquette

  Another sound, like someone running. Panting and footfalls on dirt, coming closer. River pointed the rifle at Surano and Kara picked up the flashlight. "Who's there?" River hollered, keeping his attention on Surano.

  Kara stood near the rear of Monroe's truck with Sage, sweeping the desert with the flashlight's beam. "Monroe," she announced. Surano glanced at her. He must've been wondering how she knew his name.

  "Get down," River commanded Surano, who laced his fingers behind his head but did nothing else.

  A flash of red in my peripheral vision caught my attention. "Simmons is here," I said to nobody in particular. Surano turned and at the sight of the approaching vehicles, lights but no sirens, he deflated. "Give it up," he shouted into the night. "They're armed."

  River started to say something in response, but thought better of it, maintaining his stony glare.

  "Don't shoot," Monroe said as he materialized from the darkness. He was panting from exertion and his T-shirt was splotched with blood and dirt. He had his hands up. "I'm hurt."

  "How bad?" Sage asked, like she was going to perform surgery on him right there. Or maybe she just wanted to know so she could torture him later. My head hurt and I closed my eyes.

  "Don't know. Bashed up in the wreck..." he eased himself into a sitting position on the ground, back against the roof of his truck. "Some kind of animal out there," he continued. "Jumped me."

  I opened my eyes and looked over at Sage. Her expression was inscrutable and she moved closer to me, placing her hand on my shoulder. For some reason, the feel of her palm seemed to ease the throbbing in my jaw and head.

  Surano licked his lips and looked around, nervous. "What kind of animal?"

  "Don't know. Didn't get a good look at it. Coyote, maybe." Monroe didn't sound convinced of that. He braced his elbows on his knees and held his head in his hands. "Pretty big, though. Never even heard it coming."

  I leaned over again, my hands on my thighs. Would a skinwalker attack a group of people like this? Or would it just watch and do things to scare us? Damn, I thought. That must've been a good whack on the head, to make me assume it's a skinwalker. Sage tightened her grip on my shoulder just as Simmons approached, carrying her own flashlight.

  "Looks like I missed all the excitement," she said. "Clint Monroe, I presume?"

  He nodded.

  "James Surano?" she looked at him in turn, but he didn't respond. She half-shrugged. "We'll find out soon enough." She stopped a couple feet from River, her demeanor expectant but patient. He lowered his rifle and handed it to her. "Thanks," she said. "Ambulance'll be here in a bit." She directed the comment to all of us as a couple more police officers arrived, both male. "Mr. Monroe, where is Nestor Bodie?"

  "There's a wash a couple miles down the road." He gestured with one hand, sounding like he didn't care anymore what happened. "He's okay."

  "Let's hope so," she said, and in her clipped tone, I heard her unspoken "and you'd better hope so, too."

  I tuned her out. I was just too tired. And hungry. I hadn't eaten much since breakfast. What the hell time was it, anyway? I heard more cars braking on the road and doors slamming. More voices. Lots. I didn't look, though. I just leaned into Sage and Kara stood on my other side. We were surrounded by newcomers and more flashlights. I wanted to sleep. I just wanted to lie down and sleep for a month, but instead I looked up, watched Simmons and another cop questioning River and Surano. This whole freakin' mess might make sense some day, I thought, as a female EMT-type talked to Monroe. Sage beckoned another EMT over, this one a wiry guy with a flattop haircut.

  "What happened?" he asked around the flashlight in his teeth as he snapped gloves on.

  "Took an elbow to the jaw," I said.

  Sage said something that sounded like "I'll kick his fucking ass" but I wasn't sure.

  "Ouch," he commiserated. "Any teeth loose?"

  I hadn't noticed. I ran my tongue around my mouth, tasted more blood. "Don't think so."

  "Can you walk? We'll have a look at you where there's more light."

  "Yeah." I started moving, and my legs felt like noodles. I waited a few seconds to get my wits back and looked over at Monroe. He was on his knees, pulling his shirt up to show the EMT something on his back. She shined the flashlight on him and I stared, not sure I was seeing what I thought I saw.

  "C'mon," Kara said, walking on one side of me while Sage walked on the other. We headed back to the road, behind the EMT guy.

  "Hang in there, baby," Sage was saying in my ear. "I'm right here."

  I smiled, though it hurt. Yeah, some day this all might make sense. Even though I had seen three long parallel tears in Monroe's skin, from his right shoulder down across his back to his left hip. Like what claws might do. I shivered, though I wasn't cold, and gripped Sage harder. It still could make sense, after a few weeks or months. Maybe years.

  But I doubted it.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I PUT KARA'S bag in her car and closed the trunk. "Call me?" I looked over at her, standing on the sidewalk outside the house chatting with Chris.

  "Duh." She stuck her tongue out at me. "Somebody's got to keep you out of trouble. And clearly, it's not going to be Sage."

  Chris laughed. "She has a point, esa. Though I can always loan you an ankle bracelet so I can keep tabs on you."

  "Funny. You're both so damn funny," I retorted, making a face. "For real. Call me when you get to Tucson." I joined them, and Kara gave me a bear hug.

  "You sure about this?" she asked, for about the thousandth time since last Friday, after what I called "the desert nuthouse."

  "If I wasn't, I wouldn't ask you."

  "Sage might've talked you into it."

  Chris hid a grin behind her hand and I shot a mock glare at her.

  "I'll own that," I said. "But in this case, I actually think I like you."

  She punched me on the arm.

  "Ow. Why does my sister hit me all the time?"

  She did it again. "Duh. We're sisters."

  "When's Jeff moving out?" Chris asked, trying to distract us.

  "End of August...shit, next month." I shook my head with mock sadness. "Another bachelor bites the dust and succumbs to the wiles of women. That leaves you, mujer." I waggled my eyebrows at Chris.

  "I'm not a bachelor anymore," she pointed out.

  "No, but you do still have a pretty nice bachelor pad, anal retentive cop that you are."

  "Now that's the pot calling the kettle black." Kara turned and hugged Chris. "Thanks for taking care of K.C. all these years. She should pay you."

  "I admit there are days I wonder why I drag this cross around," Chris said with a long-suffering sigh. "Like this past week or so, for example." She glanced at me over Kara's head and I gave her an "oh, please" look. "But I kinda like her."

  Kara gave me another hug. "Don't do anything else that's stupid," she remonstrated, but she was smiling. "And thanks for everything."

  "You're welcome. And thanks for helping out. Be safe and I guess we might see you next month, if you're into hanging in Albuquerque for a while as you try to--you know. Find yourself and all. And seriously, Kara. If in the next month you decide to do something else, that's fine, too. We'll find someone else for Jeff's place. Let's talk about it in a couple of weeks. See where you are." I meant it. If Kara flaked out on this, it was fine. That was part of who she was, and besides, when the shit hit the fan, she had been right there, every step of the way. She was entitled to a little flakiness now and again, I had decided in the past few days.

  "Thanks." She pulled away and studied me for a moment. "You okay?"

  I touched the spot on my jaw that was still tender, now a light yellow from the fading bruise. "For the most part." The physical would heal. The emotional--different story. I still had a lot to process, and I wasn't sure how to go about it.

  "Take care." She moved to the driver's side of her car and threw a wave before she climbed in. As she pulled away from the curb, I knew I'd miss her and
that surprised me. Strange, how things worked out. I waited until she turned the corner before I addressed Chris.

  "I think I might take you up on one of those ankle bracelets."

  She put her arm around my shoulders as we headed back into the house. "How about a beer instead?"

  "You drinking with me?"

  "Yes."

  I retrieved two bottles from the fridge, popped the tops, and handed one to Chris. "Front porch?" she asked and I nodded, not wanting to sit out back, preferring instead the front, where I could see traffic and pedestrians and feel like the world was okay, and that things were normal. I followed her and we sank into the chairs on the porch. Chris sat looking out over the street, sipping from her bottle. She hadn't lectured me about what had happened with Monroe and Surano, hadn't even said anything along the lines of how crazy I was or how I needed to leave that kind of shit to the professionals. She hadn't needed to, I guessed, because she read me pretty well.

  "Melissa called this morning," I said after a while.

  "And?"

  "She'll be coming by this weekend to help Sage go through the investment portfolios Bill left."

  "Does Sage want you in on that?"

  "Yep. She also wants to set up an art scholarship at Diné College in Shiprock."

  "Good. On both counts." Chris took another sip of beer. "How's Nestor?"

  "Beat up. But he'll live. We gave him a copy of Bill's log and of

  Bill's correspondence and Nestor wants to spearhead a class action against Ridge Star. Melissa said she knows an Indian lawyer in Denver who'd be interested in helping out." I watched the neighbor across the street pull her car into her driveway. "I'd like to see something like that. Though Bill was kind of a jerk in the past, it seems he tried to do something right. And Ridge Star could use more than a fine or a little slap on the wrist. These are real people working for them, after all."

  "How's Sage taking all this?"

  "She goes back and forth. But she wants to deal with it. She grieves, but she's not sure what for."

  "What could have been, maybe. Or it could be she's releasing anger that way. The two aren't unrelated, after all."

  I laughed. "I forget, sometimes, about your counseling background."

  "That's not it. I'm just wise beyond my years." She kept a straight face for a few seconds before grinning at me. "Anything going on with River?"

  I sighed. "Simmons isn't saying anything about the gun incident. His permit's in order, given what he does for a living, and his gun is legal. As far as she's concerned, he acted thinking we were threatened. She'll keep us posted, after the initial courtroom crap with Surano and Monroe. If Surano doesn't say anything or press charges against him, River'll be in the clear. Simmons thinks that even if that does happen, a good lawyer will help him out."

  "Dayna--"

  "No."

  She looked at me.

  "Not because I don't think she'd be awesome," I hurried to explain. "Sage and I talked about it and we both agree. We don't want her put in a bad position if something fucked up happens and River has to deal with legal ramifications. Bill's lawyer offered to help out. One of his colleagues does that kind of work and it's not like River can't afford it, with the investments Bill left." I shook my head. "He lost it a little, Chris."

  "But not too much. It's fixable."

  "I hope so. As if this situation wasn't already off its axis."

  She reached over and squeezed my arm. "You're alive and okay. So is Sage, so is River. I'd say you came out all right."

  I stared at her like a horn had just popped out of her forehead.

  She stared back. "What?"

  "Holy shit, where's my best friend? The one who puts her cop suit on and tells me that I need to let a professional deal with situations like this?"

  She turned toward me then, and looked at me with an expression I wasn't sure I recognized. "You already know that. And sometimes situations are beyond control. You didn't want to go running around out there from the beginning. But you did it because you knew it was something Sage and River needed to do, and you figured you could help. Was it the right thing to do?" She took my hand. "I don't know. The end doesn't always justify the means, but in this case, it worked out, messy as it was." She squeezed my hand and released it. "You don't go looking for trouble, but you're not afraid of it when it presents itself. For that, I have a great deal of respect for you."

  I wiped my eyes. "Jesus, Chris. You're making me cry, here."

  "Tú eres familia. And that will never change. Did I think what you did was a good idea?" She grinned. "I had my reservations, but you saw it through to the end, and you're owning it." She held her beer bottle up and I clinked mine against it. "I love you, Kase. I'll tell you when you fuck up, but I'll also tell you when you don't. And, mi amiga, I'm honored that you're still in my life after all my lectures."

  "God, I'm such a baby," I muttered as I used the hem of my T-shirt to wipe my face. "And you know I need your lectures sometimes," I said through the cloth before I released it.

  "Like I need yours." She leaned over and pecked me on the cheek. "So how about we all go out to dinner tomorrow? Dayna wanted me to ask."

  "Sounds good. I could use a wild night out. With no freaky stuff happening, no dark and scary roads, no assholes."

  "Speaking of, who's claiming responsibility for what happened to Bill?"

  I made a disgusted noise. "Heard from Simmons about that yesterday. Purcell did try to get a little blackmail action out of Monroe, but then Monroe said he'd take him down with him if anybody ever found out about Bill."

  "So we've got three guys playing off each other in the wake of an accidental death."

  "Seems that way. For now. Monroe claims he just told Surano to 'shake Bill up a bit,' and that he didn't know Surano would take it that far. Surano agrees that Monroe told him to do the whole scare tactic thing, but he's also saying that Monroe told him that if anything worse happened to Bill out there, it'd be a good idea. Surano had Bill in his own truck and Purcell drove his truck out before they put the plan in action and parked on Manyhorses' road."

  "Nice to have a cousin like that," Chris said dryly. "Always willing to help you move the bodies."

  "I think Purcell used a little blackmail on Surano, too, family ties notwithstanding. Anyway, so Purcell parks out there, just another truck on a ranch road. Once Surano had Bill tied to the stake, he left and parked where the road to the wash meets the main road. Purcell met him there and Surano says he drove Purcell halfway to the wash and let him out, that Purcell was dressed in some kind of furry, scary outfit." Kara had been right about that. "So Purcell and Surano both go down there, making weird noises but Bill had already managed to free himself and he took off running." I studied the label on my bottle.

  "He was running so fast he outran Surano, who's in good shape. Purcell isn't all that great on his feet, so no problem for Bill there. Surano says that Bill took off, but Purcell yelled at him so Surano went back to get the stake, thinking they'd just pick Bill up in a minute. After all, where was he going to go out there?"

  "So when did they say that the other thing showed up?"

  I looked over at Chris, trying to gauge whether she was teasing me or not. She wasn't. "Surano claims something was out there, and at first he thought it was a coyote. He pulled the stake and said he yelled at the alleged coyote, and threw a couple of rocks in the general direction that he heard it--remember, it was dark out--and then started back to Purcell. They got back into their respective trucks and Surano went first. He said they weren't two hundred yards from the wash when something jumped into the bed of his truck."

  Chris raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.

  "He freaked, and started swerving around, trying to dislodge it. He said that he thought he had, and he sped up, but then something banged against the left side of his truck. All this while he was driving forty-five to fifty on that road." I remembered the thing that had chased me and Sage, and the sound it made
when it hit the roof, and I wondered if I was just as crazy as Surano.

  "He's not denying that he hit Bill, and Simmons has Surano's truck. They're going over it for physical evidence and I'm sure they'll find something in there. Or on there, as the case may be." I envisioned the right front of Surano's truck slamming into Bill's back and I grimaced. "But Surano said he didn't mean to kill him, that something was chasing him and he didn't see Bill."

  "So he hits him and doesn't think he did?" Chris was skeptical.

  "No, he said he knew he hit him, that he saw Bill in his headlights, but too late to avoid him."

  Chris didn't say anything for a long time and I didn't offer any comments, either. She took another swallow of beer before speaking. "And he and Purcell kept going."

  "Surano admits he freaked and that he should have stopped."

  "But he didn't."

  "No."

  "Why didn't Bill just leave the road and continue through the desert?"

  "I don't know." And maybe we'd never know.

  "What do you think?" she asked after another pause.

  "I don't know that, either." I took another swallow of beer. "I don't know what's out there, but something happened to me and Sage. And Monroe. I don't know if we can call it collective psychosis or a group hallucination, but something chased me and Sage and something scared Surano that night Bill died. And something attacked Monroe. Maybe it is just a nutty feral dog. Or a coyote with a really bad attitude. I don't know. The worst part is, I don't think we'll ever know what happened out there, either last Friday or the night Bill died." I ran a hand through my hair, frustrated all over again.