The Midwife and the Lawman

by Marisa Carroll

  “Yes, ma’am. We can always hope.” But he wasn’t going to bet his life on it—or anyone else’s if he could help it.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  DEVON AWOKE, feeling weary and drained again. She’d slept very little, spending most of the darkest hours of the night watching the play of lightning patterns above the mountains, wondering if one or more of the white-hot strikes would find the fuel it needed to smolder away until a stray gust of wind fanned it into hungry flame. But it wasn’t only fear of wildfire on the mountain that had kept her awake. It had been seeing Miguel again.

  She’d had no idea it would be such a shock, a jolt of pure physical awareness and need that had weakened her knees and made it hard to catch her breath. She had wanted to touch him so badly she had to stuff her hand in her pocket to keep from doing so. The effort to keep her voice and expression pleasant and normal when she’d introduced him to her mother had been intense. And hearing the echo of her own words when she’d lied and said they were only friends had cut like a knife. She didn’t want to be his friend. She wanted to be his wife. His love. If she was going to react like that when all he did was walk into a room, how was she going to get through the wedding celebrations next week? The rest of her life?

  She showered and dressed for work. It wasn’t light enough yet to see if there was smoke spiraling up among the pines in the higher elevations, but she hadn’t heard the emergency sirens go off during the night. That was a good sign. She hoped the wind she heard sighing among the aspens in the yard would die away with the sunrise, leaving the morning still and quiet.

  Devon was pouring milk into a bowl of cornflakes when she heard someone coming down the stairs. Sylvia. There were dark circles under her eyes. Her face was puffy and so were her fingers. She moved with the ponderous grace of a very pregnant woman. The baby had dropped in the past few days, Devon had noted. The girl could go into labor at any time, still without plans for what she wanted to do once the baby was born.

  In order not to put any more pressure on Sylvia, Devon had quietly begun acquiring a few of the most basic newborn supplies. If Sylvia kept the baby, she would say they were a gift. If she gave the baby up for adoption, they would stay on the top shelf of the closet. There would be more important things to think about than diapers and receiving blankets.

  Devon had told both Jesse and Sylvia what she’d learned about their aunt the night before. Sylvia had nodded, tears in her eyes. “She’s looking for us,” she said. “But even if she goes to our cousin, he won’t be able to tell her anything.”

  “Then she’ll come back here,” Jesse had said, his jaw tight.

  “And we’ll be waiting here for her,” Sylvia repeated. Jesse had stalked off into the bathroom and shut the door, quietly, so he didn’t waken Maria, but there was anger in the restraint.

  “He wants to go,” Sylvia had said. “He’s getting worried. Tomorrow is the last day Señor Manny has work for him. He doesn’t know if there’s enough money to fix the truck…and to help you pay for what it is costing you to let us stay here.”

  “You don’t owe me anything.”

  Sylvia had shaken her head, a tear slipping down her cheek, before she’d turned to climb the stairs. “We owe you more than we can ever repay.”

  Devon banished the memories of the night before and smiled a greeting. “Good morning,” she said, doing her best to hide her worry from the young mother-to-be. “Did you sleep well?”

  Sylvia went to the refrigerator and poured a glass of orange juice. “Maria couldn’t get to sleep because of the lightning. I stayed up with her.” She put her hand to the small of her back, a slight frown marring the smooth skin of her forehead.

  “How are you feeling this morning?”

  “I don’t know. Tired and achy. My back hurts.”

  “No cramps, no spotting?”

  Color drained from beneath her skin. “No. No, I’m just tired. The baby isn’t coming. I’m sure of that.” Her voice rose a little with each word.

  “You’re probably right,” Devon said. The baby would come in its own good time. But if, when she returned in the afternoon, Sylvia’s face and fingers still looked so puffy, she was going to insist on taking her blood pressure. There was always the possibility she might develop toxemia, and Devon didn’t want to take any chances.

  Maria walked into the kitchen next, her hair sticking up all over her head, the doll Devon had bought for her clutched in her arms. “I’m still sleepy,” she complained. “But my tummy is hungry and wanted to get up.”

  “You can eat breakfast and then go lie down and watch television for a while,” Devon suggested. “How does that sound?”

  Maria yawned hugely. “Bueno,” she said. “I want cereal and toast.”

  She sat down beside Devon and placed her doll on the empty seat beside her, rested her elbows on the table and put her chin in her hands. “There was too much noise to sleep last night. Like guns in the sky,” she said. “They shoot guns where we lived with Cousin Rodrigo. I didn’t like it.”

  “It was just thunder and lightning, honey,” Devon said as Sylvia placed bread in the toaster and took a bowl out of the cupboard. “No guns.”

  “I didn’t like it, anyway. And I don’t want to go back to Rodrigo’s. I like it here. We’re going to stay here, aren’t we, Sylvia?”

  Her sister didn’t turn around, but the spoon she’d taken out of the silverware drawer jangled against the china bowl. “I hope so, Maria.”

  Maria was quick as always to pick up on the emotions of those around her. Her lower lip trembled. She looked at Devon with tears in her eyes. “I want to stay.”

  “Of course you can stay,” Devon said, forcing a smile to her lips. “And if you’re a good girl today, we’ll go for ice cream after supper, okay?”

  “I’m going to be very good. Will the señora, your mother, come, too? I like her.” Sylvia set her toast and cereal in front of her. Maria picked up her spoon and began to eat as she waited for Devon’s answer.

  “I think she would like that, too. I’ll call her from the clinic and invite her and my father to come with us.”

  “We can split another banana split.” The hint of tears had disappeared. Maria tipped her head, waiting to see if Devon caught the play on words that Myrna had taught her the first night they met.

  “Ha, ha. Very funny.” Devon rolled her eyes and made a face, just as Maria wanted her to do. “That’s a good one.”

  Maria giggled, her mouth full of toast. “I know. A good one.”

  They heard Jesse coming down the stairs. His feet pounded across the main room of the cabin, and the front door slammed back against the wall with a bang. Devon and Sylvia both hurried out of the kitchen. The sun had risen while they were eating, and morning light flooded through the big uncovered window.

  Jesse was out on the porch, barefoot, his shirt hanging open. He was staring out at something Devon couldn’t see. From the town below, emergency sirens had begun to wail. The sound of an engine being gunned to life came from the direction of Miguel’s place, followed by the flash of red-and-blue lights as he headed into town. She knew what she would see even before she stepped across the threshold into the cool morning air.

  “Madre de Dios,” Sylvia whispered, making the sign of the cross.

  Off in the distance a ribbon of white smoke spiraled into the blue-gray dawn sky. Across the ridge a second thicker column rose toward the sun.

  Her nighttime fears had come true. There was fire on the mountain.

  HE MADE IT to the station in seven minutes. Lights but no siren, no use waking those citizens of Enchantment still asleep in their beds. Miguel had no doubt he’d spend enough time over the next hours and days, and maybe even weeks, soothing jangled nerves and ruffled feathers if the fires got out of hand. No need to start before he had to.

  He’d come awake a split second before the phone began to ring. That happened more and more often since he’d become chief, just the way it used to back in the Marine
Corps. How he’d hated being awakened by the blinding overhead lights and bellows from his drill instructor. Later, in Somalia, it evolved from habit to a survival skill, one he’d honed to perfection. He’d looked out his bedroom window and knew without hearing Doris’s voice on the other end of the phone that there was fire on the mountain.

  He shouldn’t have been surprised after last night’s lightning display, but he’d hoped against hope they might somehow make it through until the winter rains. He counted two columns of smoke in his line of sight. “I see it,” he told the dispatcher without preamble. “Give me ten minutes.”

  Hank Jensen and Lorenzo Cooper were already at the station when he arrived. Three of the town’s auxiliary police followed him through the door. Doris was at her console in the cubbyhole radio room. “The mayor’s on line two, but I put him on hold. I figured you’d want to talk to the fire chief and the state boys first.”

  “Thanks, Doris. What’s Chief Michaels got to say?”

  “He’s already out trying to pinpoint the locations of the flare-ups. He’s mobilized all four engines and the tanker trucks, but he thinks they’re both too far off-road for him to get very close.”

  “We need aerial spotters. Get me the Forest Service guy over in Taos. This is really their bailiwick. Our job is to keep this town calm and under control. While you’re raising him, I’ll talk to the mayor. He should be in on this. We’ll wait for the spotters’ reports to come in, but my guess is they’ll want to set up their command post higher up the mountain. Probably at Angel’s Gate. Better give the manager a call and tell him to prepare for some unexpected guests.”

  Seventy-two hours later, he still hadn’t found time to shave, but none of the other men grouped around the metal folding tables in the lobby of Angel’s Gate looked much better. By his count, there were fifty or sixty people all told. The place was so damned big it didn’t look crowded, just busy and purposeful. The feds had arrived early in the afternoon of the first day and pretty much taken over the show. Miguel was glad they had once the wind picked up and the two fires merged near the base of Silver Canyon. He leaned one shoulder against a pillar where he could see pretty much everything that was going on and still keep an eye on the dark wall of smoke that spiraled skyward across the valley, turning the sunrise a thousand shades of pink and orange. Smoke could do that, make hell on earth and glory in the sky.

  A tall Native American woman was getting ready to give a press conference. Her title was information officer, and since she was with the Incident Management Team from North Carolina, he figured she was probably Cherokee. She was dressed in a khaki jump-suit and combat boots and looked as if she could handle just about anything anyone threw at her. Miguel had liked her on sight. Some of the feds were a damned pain in the butt, but she knew her business and she didn’t take guff from anyone.

  To his left a couple of TV reporters were doing run-throughs of their lead-ins for the noon newscast. They seemed oblivious to the fact that they were creating an obstacle for the dozens of U.S. Forest Service personnel, New Mexico State Highway Patrol officers and volunteer fire crews from half a dozen states. And now just being ushered through the main door by the unflappable doorman, were a score of ranchers in jeans and dusty boots, members of Arroyo County’s mounted search-and-rescue team, whose skill on horseback and knowledge of the mountain were being put to good use.

  Miguel saw Ben Carson across the room accepting a cup of coffee from one of the members of the Enchantment American Legion Auxiliary. His clothes were dirty, his face shadowed by a three-day growth of beard and his eyes bloodshot from too much smoke and too little sleep. He lifted a finger to the brim of his hat to acknowledge Miguel’s presence, and Miguel returned the salute.

  He’d give the guys a chance to get something to eat before he got their report. They were doing a hell of a job keeping overzealous reporters, amateur photographers and just plain nutcases out of the danger zone. He was going to owe Ben and his group a big thank-you when this was all over.

  There were other civilian volunteers milling around with trays of coffee and fruit juice and bottled water. They came from all over. Enchantment and Red River, Taos, Albuquerque and Santa Fe. Some from as far away as Denver and even Montana.

  But no matter how many there were, they seemed outnumbered by the media. They were everywhere, print and network and cable-TV affiliates. From dawn to midnight their satellite trucks were parked end to end on the scenic turnouts along Desert Valley Road, the closest his men and the state patrol had allowed them to get. They’d taken every available room in the hotel and every available inch of space in Enchantment they could wheedle or bribe their way into. Slim Jim’s and the Sunflower Café’s tables were packed with them morning, noon and night. Miguel had the uncharitable notion that some of them were going to be disappointed if the whole town didn’t go up in smoke.

  The only people who looked as if they had nothing important to do at the moment were the impeccably groomed hotel desk staff, still on duty, even though most of the guests had chosen to check out early, rather than be unceremoniously rousted from their rooms in the event the wind shifted yet again and sent the fire heading toward the hotel.

  “Ladies and gentlemen. I’ll begin the briefing in five minutes.” It was the IMT woman speaking again. Miguel couldn’t resist glancing at his watch. If she said five minutes, she meant five minutes. The media crews scrambled to get into position.

  “Hey, Miguel. As usual I need a quote from law enforcement for the special edition of the Bulletin I’m putting out tomorrow.” Nolan McKinnon detached himself from the gaggle of reporters ringing the information officer and headed over to Miguel.

  “Don’t you want to hear what she has to say?” Miguel asked, inclining his head in the IMT woman’s direction.

  “I can listen and talk to you at the same time. I’ve got a pretty good ear for picking out the important stuff. Besides I’ve already got the handout.” He glanced down at the sheet of paper in his hand. “The fire’s involved thirty-five hundred acres along upper Silver Creek. They’re using four helicopters, a Super Huey 205, a Bell Jet Ranger…”

  Miguel only half listened to Nolan’s recitation; he was due to be briefed along with other law-enforcement personnel by the feds after the press conference. But suddenly Nolan’s words registered. “What did you just say?” He reached out and grabbed the sheet of paper from Nolan’s hand. “Jump the line if the wind changes direction.” He looked up. “They know damned well the wind is going to pick up and swing around to the south this afternoon. The weather guys have predicted it all week. Damn those feds. Why am I always the last to know this stuff? It’s my town and my people out there.”

  Nolan switched off the tape recorder he held in his hand. “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger. But if the fire does shift, that means it’ll head up the canyon. Doesn’t your granddad live out that way?”

  THE AFTERNOON SUNLIGHT WAS MUTED by the pall of smoke that hung over the valley. From where she was standing in her grandmother’s office, Devon couldn’t see any flames on the mountain, but that was little consolation. They were there whether she could see them or not. Later, when the sun set in a surreal kaleidoscope of oranges and reds, the flames would appear once more, a menacing counterpoint to the beauty in the sky.

  Lydia came to stand beside her. Devon turned her head and gave her grandmother a smile. “You should be resting,” she said. “You’ve been up since three.”

  “I just wanted to check on mother and baby one more time,” Lydia said. Bridget Escalante had delivered a small but beautiful baby girl during the night. She and her husband were still in the birthing room. They had nowhere else to go at the moment. The highway patrol had closed Silver Creek Road above their homestead, and evacuated them just before dawn.

  Lydia crossed to stand beside Devon at the window. “Since the baby’s so small, maybe we should have Dr. Jo look her over before they leave.”

  “I’ll give her a call and ask her to stop in on
her way home,” Devon said. “How is the new family doing?” She’d spent the past half hour making her report and updating charts in the office across the hall that seemed to have become hers by default.

  “Mother and baby are getting to know each other. The father is snoring away in the chair. It’s a shame Bridget’s first labor had to take place under such trying circumstances, but she did well. I hope the authorities will allow them back into their home soon. In the meantime they can stay here for as long as need be.”

  They were silent for a few moments, and Devon realized it was the comfortable silence of old friends, not the awkward gap in conversation that had so often been their lot these past years. Things had changed between them the afternoon she had told her grandmother the truth about the children’s circumstances. They were united now in their attempt to protect them.

  “Have you and Miguel decided what you’re going to do about the rehearsal dinner?” Lydia asked, still watching the smoke rise into a gloriously tinted sunrise. “The fire team has set up headquarters there.”

  “I haven’t had a chance to talk to Miguel about it.” She had to force the words past a sudden lump in her throat. Would she ever speak to Miguel again?

  “I’m sure Kim and Nolan will understand if you decide to cancel.”

  “I know they will, but there’s still a day or two to make up our minds.”

  “Yes, I suppose there is.”

  In her heart of hearts Devon wanted to cancel the party. She would get through Kim and Nolan’s wedding because she wouldn’t let her cousin down. But hosting the party with Miguel at her side, polite and withdrawn, would be more than she could bear, and then knowing she had to turn around and do it all again the next day…! “The wind’s picking up,” she said to change the subject.

  “I felt it switch a while back. The window in the green birthing room always rattles when the wind’s from the south. It’s nearly seven. Why don’t I turn on the radio and see if there are any updates while you make us a cup of tea?”