Hunted in Conard County

by Rachel Lee

“I have seizures,” she answered. “What you just saw...well, that was the kind I have. I lose touch, sometimes for only a few seconds, sometimes for a minute or two, and when I come out of it I feel a bit confused. Especially if things have moved around. Well, y’all did a lot of moving.”

  That drew forth a bit of laughter and some of the tension seemed to seep from the room. There was new interest in those faces and she wondered how much she’d have to tell them. She decided to head it off at the pass.

  “That’s why I have Snowy with me. He can alert me right before it happens, so I don’t freeze in traffic or something. It was kind of you all not to ask why I have a service dog.”

  “Not our business,” one of the other young women said. “We were just worried about you. Your dog poked your leg a few times, then suddenly you stopped talking.”

  “Weird, huh?” she said. “Well, that’s as bad as it gets. It doesn’t happen all the time, though. Think you guys can deal?”

  They all agreed they could. No doubt in any of their voices.

  “Then let’s continue class. Where was I?”

  Alice spoke. “You were telling us about the Supreme Court decision that allows cops to be videotaped while on the job.”

  “Yes. That’s undoubtedly why you see so much footage online now. Better behave yourselves.”

  Another laugh from the group, this one entirely comfortable. Okay, then. She was ready to plunge into the details of what that meant for police.

  Better that than let the hovering embarrassment swallow her.

  * * *

  Class finished shortly after five. The students hurried out, glad to be done for the day and probably heading straight for food in the dining hall. She’d heard that it was a pretty good one, too, as well as a popular hangout.

  Snowy stood up and stretched, back legs reaching nearly straight out. He even yawned. She wondered what kind of patience that dog must exert to steadfastly remain with her for hours when she wasn’t doing anything he might enjoy, like taking a walk.

  Well, they had a walk ahead of them now. She allowed a fleeting moment to wonder what she was going to do when it got really cold and snowy, and decided she’d deal with that when the time grew closer. Right now a walk in pleasant autumn air was a treat.

  Snowy seemed eager to get going—he’d already learned the new schedule—and looked at her with his tail wagging quickly. Okay, then. She put the last of her desk items in her backpack, wondering if she should detour to her tiny office or just head home.

  Home, she decided. She still had to cook her dinner. It wasn’t a thrilling prospect. Just last month she’d been frying some breaded eggplant when she’d spaced, coming back to find it all blackened and wondering what the hell had happened. Of course she knew, but in the moments immediately following one of her episodes, with absolutely no memory of blinking out, it was always confusing. She’d asked the neurologist if the confusion was part of the seizure or just caused by the changes that occurred during one.

  His answer hadn’t been exactly reassuring. “I don’t know. It could be either.”

  Oh, yeah, burned eggplant when she knew she had these absence episodes and she still got confused. Like today in class.

  She could almost have sighed as she walked toward the exterior door at the end of the hallway. Well, that little episode was probably going to develop legs. Her employers knew about it, but she wasn’t keen on being a topic on the local grapevine. As if she could have prevented it forever.

  Maybe after dinner she’d call one of her former colleagues and friends back in Florida. She missed them, but being with them constantly reminded her of how much she had lost.

  Snowy appeared thrilled to be outdoors and moving. He stayed at her side, ignoring distractions, but she couldn’t mistake his prancing step and his perked-up ears and tail.

  He was feeling good. Well, so was she despite the incident. The air was dry with the slightest nip. Her stride quickened as they strode toward home. God, it was so different from Florida. The dry weather, the lack of palms...it was like another universe.

  Just as her apartment house came into sight, a car pulled up beside her, motor humming. She looked over and through the open passenger window saw Stu. He was still in uniform and just as attractive as she recalled.

  “Hey, lady, want a ride?”

  “Where? In the back seat?”

  He flashed a grin. “Only the front seat for you.”

  She returned his smile but shook her head a bit. “Snowy needs this walk. He’s been pinned lying beside me for three hours.”

  “Then how about I zoom by Maude’s and bring some dinner to your place?”

  Part of her tried to pull back, fearing where closer contact might lead. Remembering the pitying looks she’d received at the station when she briefly returned to work. Facing again that she was now irrevocably flawed.

  But Stu was smiling, her fears seemed a bit much when she hardly knew the man and she didn’t at all feel like cooking dinner for one out of nearly empty cupboards. “Sounds great. Thank you.”

  “Same as last time? Should I add a latte?”

  The meal last week had been scrumptious and had lasted through a second dinner. “It’s an offer I can’t refuse,” she admitted. “And a latte, please.”

  “See you at your place.” The patrol SUV slid away and disappeared around the next corner.

  Kerri was still smiling when she got back to her building, and since she figured it would take Stu at least a little while to round up dinner, she went into the back courtyard with Snowy. She unhooked his leash and removed his vest, allowing him to dash wildly around for a few minutes before she pulled a bright yellow tennis ball from her backpack.

  Playing fetch with that tennis ball was one of Snowy’s absolute favorite things. The minute he saw one, he immediately went into the play bow, down on his front legs with his tail wagging frantically. She watched him dash joyously around and bring the ball back to her, looking up hopefully every time he returned it.

  No question but that Snowy was the best thing that had happened to her since she was shot.

  “Special delivery,” called a voice from near the fence. Kerri turned around and saw Stu on the far side of the fence with a couple of bags. “Want me to go up?”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  Snowy evidently sensed that playtime was over. He approached and sat, waiting for her to hook his leash to his collar. She carried the vest along with her backpack. He didn’t exactly need it here.

  There was a back stairway in the middle of the building from the courtyard. It was a duplicate of the front stairway that rose to meet it across a tiny foyer. On either side, the hallway stretched toward other units. Hers was the farthest down the hall to the right from here.

  Stu was already waiting for her.

  “What did you do?” she asked as she approached. “Run?”

  “Running up stairs is great exercise. Besides, you don’t need me to tell you how often that might be necessary on the job.”

  It was true. Most Florida apartment houses had stairways open to the weather, and even hallways on the exterior of the buildings rather than the interior. What was often missing was an elevator, which, when you lived on the fourth floor, could make carrying groceries a pain.

  “This is different,” she remarked as she unlocked her door. “The stairways are enclosed and there are heavy doors at the bottom. Where I came from, most of this would be open.”

  “I never thought about that,” he said as he followed her inside. “Different weather?”

  “That’s my guess. It was just so familiar I never thought about it either, until I came here.”

  Stu put the plastic bags on her counter as he had last week, then said, “I need to run down for the coffee.”

  “Oh, you should have told me! There’s a gate I could have c
ome through to help.”

  He nodded. “I know. But I need the exercise, right? Hey, I could have said something, so don’t feel bad about it.”

  He hurried out and Snowy surprised her by sitting at the door almost hopefully.

  “Traitor,” she said cheerfully, wondering how the dog had become attached so fast. It was okay, though. He wasn’t wearing his vest so he knew he wasn’t working.

  However, she’d experienced just how fast he could get on the job when he sensed a seizure coming. An absolutely remarkable animal, and totally lovable as far as she was concerned.

  She had just finished pulling plates out of the cupboard, followed by some flatware, when Stu returned without his gun belt, carrying the cardboard tray holding coffee.

  At least she hadn’t had to leave everything behind when she moved here. Not that she’d really had much to begin with. The basics, mostly, with a little extra so she could entertain a few friends.

  That meant she had two stools at the kitchen bar, furniture in her living room and a comfortable bed to sleep on. Kitchen utensils had tagged along. Considering she didn’t care much for shopping, and given that she didn’t know how much she could easily find here, she was all too glad to have her familiar things around her, worn or not.

  Stu took a couple of minutes to introduce himself properly to Snowy, then was allowed to give the dog a good scratch around the neck.

  “I think you’ve made a friend for life,” Kerri remarked.

  Stu grinned at her from his squatting position. “That’s the idea.” He straightened. “Okay, let me help put dinner out.”

  That it was the same meal as last week didn’t bother her at all. When she’d been working as a cop, she sometimes ate the same foods for days on end simply because it was easy to get and she often didn’t feel like cooking after a long shift, or a troubling day. After she’d moved from patrol into the victims unit, she had too many troubling days.

  They sat side by side at the bar, enjoying the steak sandwiches and fries. He’d even remembered her preference for the broccoli. Good man.

  “What exactly did you do in your former job?” he asked her while they ate.

  She gave him a wry look. “I’m surprised you didn’t investigate my entire background. You have the tools.”

  He returned her look. “Didn’t want to invade your privacy, but that doesn’t mean I’m not curious. Oh!” he said suddenly.

  “What?”

  “That foam container over there. Did you look in it?”

  She shook her head. “I assumed it was for you once I found the dinners.”

  “Maude sent it for Snowy. Hamburger patty.”

  Kerri felt a whisper of warmth slip through her, touching some of her empty places. “That’s sweet.” She glanced down and saw Snowy sitting at attention. “I think he smells it.”

  “Probably,” Stu laughed. “Can he eat it out of the container?”

  “He has before.”

  Stu rose immediately, and opened the box, placing it on the kitchen floor.

  Snowy strained toward it without leaving his place. Kerri told him it was okay and he wasted no time.

  “It amazes me that dogs eat so fast,” she remarked. “Hardly time to enjoy it.”

  “Doesn’t seem to bother him.” He put his sandwich down and returned his attention to her. “Your job with the force? Patrol?”

  She hesitated. “I was on patrol before. Then I moved to the victims unit.”

  He winced slightly. “Rough.”

  “Yeah, it could be. Then I was trained to be a negotiator in domestic disputes and to support victims. Especially rape victims.”

  “Oh, hell,” he said sympathetically. “That’s the worst. Why you?”

  “Because I’m a woman. Studies have shown that women are more likely to deescalate domestics than men. So it fell to me. I had some success, too.”

  He nodded slowly. “I bet you did.”

  “Meaning?” For some reason she almost bristled.

  “It’s your demeanor,” he said as he once again lifted his sandwich. “I bet you didn’t go in all tough and full of orders.”

  She relaxed again. “Nope.” Then she had to laugh. “Guys don’t usually feel threatened by a woman, even one in uniform.”

  “They should know better.” He winked as he chewed. “Domestics are really dangerous. It took a lot of guts for you to walk in there.”

  Guts? She wondered if she still had any. Apart from her disability, she couldn’t know if she’d ever walk into the middle of a domestic dispute again. Much as she hated the idea, she might now be too afraid to do her old job, even if she hadn’t been left with permanent brain damage.

  “What happened?” Stu asked quietly.

  She looked down at her plate. She’d done a fairly good job on her sandwich, but the fries remained untouched. Her stomach knotted in response to his question, and she knew she was done eating for a while.

  “Forget I asked,” he said, as if he’d read something on her face. “None of my business.”

  He’d hear about it. She was certain of that. The question was, did she want someone else to give him a brief version, or did she want to lay it all out for him? He needed to understand the whole thing if they were going to become friends.

  If she’d let him come so close. Having a mountain of problems to deal with already, friendship sounded like just something more she’d need to handle.

  But she’d never been an isolated person. She’d always had friends and plenty of good people to hang with. It was the best way to relieve the pressures of the job and forget about them for a few hours.

  But she didn’t have those same pressures here, and it just sounded like another complication amid the already huge mound she had to handle. Or maybe she was afraid of his reaction. She’d already learned that some people didn’t react well to the word epilepsy.

  Stu let the entire subject drop. The tension in her stomach eased a little, and finally she reached for a thick home fry.

  After they finished eating, Stu helped with the cleanup, and she fed Snowy his bowl of kibble. Tonight, unlike the last visit, her new friend seemed in no hurry to leave. For the first time she had reason to wonder about his personal life. Yeah, he’d taken her to the diner for dinner and driven her home, but that didn’t mean he lacked people who might be waiting for him. He’d kind of suggested he lived alone when he’d mentioned needing to wash his breakfast dishes last week, but she knew almost nothing about him. Of course, she wasn’t exactly forthcoming, either.

  As they settled in her living room, him on the recliner, her on the battered sofa, she asked, “No family at home?”

  He shook his head. “I’m a confirmed bachelor.”

  She felt the corners of her mouth lift a little and was glad that complication didn’t seem in the offing. “Any particular reason?”

  He shrugged. “Not exactly a conscious decision but I haven’t yet met anyone who makes me want to give up my independence.”

  She laughed. “Neither have I.”

  “There you go. It’s not that I’m opposed, it’s that...well, I guess I’m picky.”

  “Good way to be when deciding the future course of your entire life.”

  Then he came straight to the point. “Can we discuss the elephant in the room?”

  She blinked. “Elephant?”

  “Your service dog.” He shook his head slightly. “Tell me to get lost if you want to, but you’re walking everywhere with a highly trained animal. Say, you need to meet Cadell Marcus.”

  She blinked once more. Had she missed something or was he hopping like an uncomfortable flea between topics? Had she seized again? “Who?”

  “Cadell Marcus. He’s the K9 trainer for the department and he’s recently started training service dogs. Sometimes he works as a deputy but he’s also g
ot a ranch he’s taking care of. I think a lot of his effort is devoted to those dogs.”

  “That’s cool. I’m lucky to have Snowy. My fellow cops chipped in to get him for me. A service dog isn’t cheap.”

  “That’s what Cadell said when he started the training. He’s making it a charity project, which means he can’t do many at a time, but at least he’s getting a few out to people who’d otherwise have to do without.”

  “I think that’s wonderful,” she said sincerely. “I would like to meet him.”

  “I think he’d like to meet you and Snowy, too.”

  They were edging toward the uncomfortable again. Deciding at last that she’d have to deal with this subject, she took the bull by the horns, as it were. Stu was justifiably curious. Better the answers came from her.

  But she still had a lot of emotional difficulty dealing with all of it. All of it. She tensed, looked down at Snowy, who’d settled by her feet, and dove into it.

  “I have a mild form of epilepsy,” she said, her voice sounding almost smothered. “Temporal lobe seizures. Like absence seizures. I simply go away for up to a couple of minutes at a time. I have no memory of it and when I return I feel confused until I get grounded again. Snowy warns me ahead of time so I don’t come to a dead halt in the middle of the street, or while doing something dangerous. He senses it far enough in advance that I can usually turn off the stove or whatever. Avoid a dangerous situation.”

  “Thank God for Snowy,” he said.

  “I couldn’t agree more.” Well, that hadn’t been so bad, she decided. He might never drop by with an offer of dinner again, but at least he wasn’t making an excuse about needing to get somewhere.

  He didn’t speak for a beat or two, then said, “I gather this wasn’t always a problem, or you wouldn’t have been a cop.”

  “No.” Her chest started to squeeze because this was a memory she didn’t want to relive any more than she wanted this illness. Some things were better left buried.

  “Kerri...”

  “Okay. Okay.” She jumped up from the couch, needing to pace to release some of the surging adrenaline in response to that night. Did she have to recall it all? Couldn’t she just escape with a brief outline?