At Close Range (11 page)

“No,” Mack said. “I get it. She wants to build a bridge. You, them, Dulce and José…the baby.”

Chance looked at him squarely, a query on his face. “That's what she said.”

“You have to go.”

Chance nodded slowly. “But I don't like leaving the place when something's going on.”

“We don't know something is going on. And even if there is, all we've encountered so far is a car-less woman with a torn shawl who's stolen a couple of burritos and a handful of cookies.”

Chance gave him a crooked grin. “That sort of puts things in perspective, doesn't it?” He went back to the stall where he'd discovered the strip of cloth. He fingered a visible nail head. “No wonder she looked like a ghost. If her skirt or her shawl caught on this, it would have billowed out behind her, then, as it pulled free, it would have snapped out of sight—as if she vanished.” He straightened and seemingly changed the subject. “Dulce tells me you've been training the kids.”

Mack stiffened. He'd wondered when somebody might object. “A few basics. The buddy system, stuff like that.”

Chance waved him to continue.

“You know, always keep an eye out for your buddy, and make sure he's safe, too. And how to defend yourself against a stranger if they grab you. Simple stuff.”

“Don't knock it. It's a good idea.”

Mack let out a pent-up breath. “Better to be prepared for things,” he said, trying to relax again. He liked Chance and didn't relish going against the marshal's objectives for the kids.

“Be Prepared. You're just expanding on the Boy Scout motto,” Chance said, and moved to the doorway of the barn. He gazed across at the main house. “Did
the kids you saved in that fire have your training?” His voice was neutral.

“No,” Mack said. He heard the screams, felt hot flames licking at his face and hands. “No, I hadn't trained anyone.”

“Is the training a result of that fire?”

“I suppose it is,” Mack said.
Help me…please, somebody…help me…

“If those kids had trained…?”

“I don't know if it would have made any difference.”

“I'd like to think it would have,” Chance said, his voice gruff with some unspoken emotion. “I'd sure like to believe that.”

“I would, too,” Mack said. He felt as if the words were torn from his soul. Maybe they were.

“In that house across the way are a group of children who need that training. They need every scrap you can give them.”

Mack flinched as Chance's hand clasped his shoulder. The gesture was brotherly in a fashion. Man to man.

He didn't tell Chance that there was also a woman in there who made him want to feel whole again just by smiling at him.

Chance said, “You're right. We'll go. I feel I'm leaving things in pretty strong hands.”

Mack wanted to protest that he'd lost five children the last time someone had trusted him.

Help me…

He thought of the way Jeannie's hand ran over her rising belly, the love she had in her eyes, on her freckled face, love for Chance, for the new baby, for the
future. He couldn't take this weekend away from them, no matter how little he might want the challenge.

Chance's hand squeezed on his shoulder as if driving in his message. “You can count on Pablo, he's a good man. I don't know much about Clovis yet, but he seems a stand-up sort of guy.”

Mack felt the shifting of reins with Chance's every word and fought his instinctive acceptance of such a tremendous responsibility. He'd pulled ten children from a hellish inferno. He'd lost five. And he'd had to listen to their cries.
“Help me…somebody…help me!”

Would the voices of his personal entourage of ghosts always call to him? Or were they some inner voice of his own, crying out against this onerous trust?

Mack almost sighed in relief when Chance's hand slipped from his shoulder. The marshal said, “You already have the kids in your corner. Seems your only problem is likely to be Corrie.”

“Corrie?” Corrie of the chestnut hair and golden voice? Corrie of the desert sand, smile on her face, tears in her eyes?

“This training thing of yours, she's not going to like it much.”

“What? Why not?” Mack asked, genuinely puzzled.

“She's a die-hard believer in the concept of kids being sheltered from bad things.”

“Bad things happen,” Mack said.

“Not in Corrie's world.”

“Come on, she's been all over the known universe, reporting on every sort of atrocity.”

“Exactly. I think she feels our kids here shouldn't be exposed to any of those influences.”

Mack said nothing, trying to reconcile this other truth about Corrie Stratton.

“She's a dreamer, our Corrie. She's a lot like the fairy princess she looks, not wanting to believe in the big bad world. She wants them to live in fantasy land.”

Mack took in Chance's statement but didn't believe it for a second. Chance was telling the truth as he saw it, but Mack was sure he didn't understand Corrie at all. She was a dreamer, all right, and she might look like an elfin princess, but she knew all about the big bad world. She knew it firsthand. And by knowing it, she wanted to provide the children at Milagro a magical place filled with wonder and awe; that didn't make her blind, it only made her vulnerable beyond reckoning.

“So you keep up with your training of the kids. They need it. Hell, I need it. We all do.”

Mack nodded, feeling in some odd way that he was betraying Corrie.

“I'll drop off this piece of cloth at the lab on the way out of town this morning. I doubt they'll be able to find anything out about it, but, just in case,” Chance said.

“As long as it's not made out of ectoplasm,” Mack said.

C
orrie sat at her desk by the window. Tonight she made no pretense of writing lyrics. Her knees were drawn up to her chest and she rested her chin upon them, hugging them tightly with her arms. Her eyes, of course, were on the lit window across the courtyard and the figure pacing back and forth in silhouetted restlessness.

Dinner that evening had been a subdued affair. Once the discussion of La Dolorosa had run its course—repeatedly—Corrie had tried keeping up a thread of conversation. But without the lively Salazar foursome, Leeza's acid comments and with Pablo and Clovis both half-asleep at their plates, her attempts dwindled into mere ramblings.

She was grateful for Mack's suggestion for an after-dinner game and for the pleasantly cool evening and soft, lingering sunset that allowed the game to be played out of doors.

Mack assembled all the children in the circle of grass at the center of the drive. He had the children, Pedro and Analissa included, stand around him in a loose circle. They spun around three times with their eyes closed, then, when he called on them, they were to open their eyes and quickly close them again.

Corrie watched, baffled by the unusual game. When one by one, Mack called on them to describe exactly what they'd seen in that brief moment their eyes were open, she began to catch a glimmer of the game's meaning.

“The barn.”

“Is the door open or closed?” Mack asked.

Watching from the veranda, Corrie had to look at the barn again herself to see that the door was standing wide open.

“Closed,” Jason said.

Mack cupped his hands over his mouth and issued a loud raspberry, a game-show buzzer signaling error.

Jason giggled. “Open,” he corrected.

“Good. Now, Juan Carlos, what did you see?”

“Two horses in the corral.”

“What two horses?”

“Uh…Lulubelle and Dancer!”

Mack made the buzzing sound again.

“Lulubelle and Plugster?”

“Bingo,” Mack said. “Very good. Any others?”

“No. Just those.”

“Very good. And Pedro? What did you see?”

“My mother at the bunkhouse,” he said in Spanish.

Corrie's eyes cut to the bunkhouse, an atavistic chill working up her spine. No one stood before or beside it.

Mack made the buzzer sound once again. “The bunkhouse is right. What else?”

“She's gone now,” Pedro said, his eyes opening and closing.

Corrie's heart wrenched. They had only picked Pedro up twenty-four hours before. The boy had silently blended with the rest of the Milagro hoard and hadn't once asked about his missing parent.

Just before dinner, Corrie had called the authorities in Carlsbad, but no sign of Pedro's mother had turned up. The new sheriff had added a dark side to the little boy's story, however. “The mother's name is Lucinda Ortega. She's the live-in wife of a real loser, Joe Turnbull.”

“What's a live-in wife?” Corrie had to ask.

“In the eyes of the law, they're not really married, as in filing a certificate somewhere, but Turnbull's her son's father and in her eyes, he's her husband. It's real common in these parts. California, too. Except New Mexico's not a common-law state, meaning poor Lucinda doesn't get diddly if she wants to divorce Joe.”

“Tell me about this charming fellow,” Corrie said.

“Charming, now there's a term I'll bet no one's ever labeled Joe Turnbull. He's got a rap sheet as long as my arm, and most of it made up of arrests for using Lucinda as a punching bag. She's tried getting away to family in Mexico, but he keeps dragging her back. His last arrest came after he assaulted the women's shelter she was hiding out in.”

“What do you mean assaulted the shelter?” Corrie asked.

“Just that. He attacked the building with a baseball
bat and threw Molotov cocktails through the broken windows.”

“He could have killed someone,” Corrie said, appalled.

“He did land a couple of women in the hospital, luckily minor wounds only. We got him out of there pretty quick, but the damage was done.”

“He's still in prison, right?” Corrie asked, knowing the answer would be in the negative. The sheriff wouldn't be telling her all this if it weren't pertinent.

“Afraid not. He copped a no-contest on the vandalism and pled out the reckless-endangerment charge, so he only pulled a year's hard time. You gotta remember, he was arraigned in the days when El Patron was still running the county. I just had word that Joe got out two days ago. Nobody's seen him, but with the kid's mother missing, I've got a real bad feeling.”

“You think he did something to her.”

“Sad to say it, but yes. Pretty obvious conclusion. And that means he's probably still around here somewhere.”

“Do you think he might come after Pedro?”

“Could be. But it probably won't be to hurt the kid. In all the arrests, he was never cited for hitting his son.”

“Chance and Jeannie are out of town,” Corrie said. Her statement wasn't nearly as irrelevant as it may have sounded.

“That's too bad, but you should be fine, way out there. Tell you what, though, have Pablo and whoever else is there on the ranch keep their eyes open, okay? And call me, day or night, if you spot anything out of the ordinary.”

She'd promised to do so and suspected the game Mack played with the children was his reaction to the phone call, though when she'd told him about it, his only outward sign of worry showed in the tiny furrow between his brows and the way he rubbed at his fingertips.

He'd acted as remote as ever, but she'd nevertheless had the impression he was more in tune with the new sheriff than she'd been. It was as if he'd taken on Chance's role at Milagro, though without Chance's grand storytelling and easygoing smile.

Throughout the somewhat subdued evening meal, his eyes had often traveled to the windows and the shadows outside. Corrie had wondered if he wasn't mentally walking the perimeter he so often patrolled at night.

Rita had joined her on the veranda for the second go-round of Mack's strange game. She watched for a few minutes, then said, “He's a smart man, Señor Mack.”

Corrie nodded.

“He walks with his own ghosts, though.”

“You think so?” Corrie asked.

“
Sí,
but they aren't like La Dolorosa. His ghosts only
he
can see.”

“That sounds so sad, Rita.”

“It is,
señora.
Very, very sad.”

“I wish…” Corrie began, only to trail off.

“You wish you could help him, no? I wish you could, too. But it's hard to help someone stop listening to their ghosts when you have so many of your own.”

Corrie turned to look at Rita. The diminutive woman, scarcely an inch shorter than she was herself,
wasn't looking at her. Her eyes were combing the grounds outside the bunkhouse.

“It's a good thing he's doing,” Rita said.

“What's that?” Corrie asked. “Teaching the children to pay attention?”

“Teaching them how to do it for their safety.”

“They're safe enough here.”

Rita's eyes cut from the bunkhouse and met Corrie's squarely. “Señor Mack knows. There's no safety anywhere for these children. For anyone. He knows.”

Corrie wanted to argue with the housekeeper, wanted to tell her that these precious few lost children had been found, and they would have safe and happy homes at Rancho Milagro. But before she could summon the right words, the tiny woman did the oddest thing; she patted Corrie's cheeks and said,
“Pobrecita, niña,”
and left the veranda.

As she'd done when her friend Leeza kissed her forehead a few nights earlier, Corrie lifted her hands to the exact spots of the unusual caress and, inanely, still felt the warmth of Rita's fingers against her skin. What had the strange gesture meant? And why did the familiarity in her touch, and by calling her “my poor little girl” make her want to cry?

Mack set the children to patrolling the fences, checking the gates and inspecting the barns. He stood in the circle of grass, a man standing alone, watching the boisterous group of children run at the gates, the fences and the various outbuildings. As if aware he was being watched, he turned and met Corrie's gaze.

He lifted a scarred hand. It wasn't much of a lover's gesture, but it seemed to lodge directly in her heart.

She dragged one hand free from her cheek and held it out.

He smiled at her.

That was all he did. He just smiled. And her bones turned to liquid. It was like the sun coming out after a month's lengthy gloom.

“Interesting game,” she called, though it was the least important thing she wanted to say to him.

He walked toward her, his catlike walk slow and deliberate, and every step making her insides quiver. Walking away from her toward the barn, he'd seemed wary, on the alert. Toward her, he looked dangerous, as if he were about to pounce.

“One you play all the time,” he said.

“Me? What are you talking about?”

He looked up at her from the steps to the veranda. “You. You don't miss a single thing. It's in your nature.”

She shrugged. “That's just training,” she said.

“Exactly,” he said. He mounted the steps.

Her heart was pounding so loudly, she couldn't have heard him if he'd spoken. In the distance, the kids were running from fence post to corral gate, checking each strand of wire, making a potentially deadly business a game.

“They're too young,” she said faintly.

“They're having fun,” he countered.

“There's no danger here,” she said. “This is Rancho Milagro.”

“A pretty name doesn't change reality. Danger exists, Corrie.”

Her heart seemed to flutter at his use of her name. But she said, “It doesn't have to be here.”

“It doesn't have to exist anywhere, but the truth is that it does. Life is cruel, it's not fair, and it's especially rough on the innocent.”

“I don't want them frightened. Teaching them to see things in a dark light can make them afraid.” She'd been afraid all her life. Every waking moment. And she'd chosen a profession where all she saw was more darkness.

Mack gave a wave at the children. “Look at them, they're having a ball. And they're paying attention to every little detail. How does that frighten them?”

She couldn't think. “It frightens me,” she said.

He lifted a hand to her hair.

She jumped, but her eyes shifted to his. As always, she couldn't read his expression.

He asked, “Remember when you were a kid and the bell would suddenly go off signaling a fire drill?”

She nodded, unconsciously leaning into the warmth of his hand.

“Remember how teachers would have us line up quietly and make an orderly exit to the hall, then march single file to whatever door we were supposed to use?”

Corrie nodded again.

“But there was never a fire, was there?”

“No.”

“No. And no one was panicked, no one was screaming, and no one was thinking for themselves, worried about their friends, remembering the way out if something happened to their teacher. No one even looked behind them, right? Because we weren't supposed to look, weren't supposed to worry, weren't supposed to even think. Right?”

Corrie nodded because it was all she could do. In his words, in his question, she could see glimpses of what had happened to Mack. Skin grafts because of burns, a fire, children screaming, utter pandemonium, a fallen teacher. Himself? She knew this, knew what had happened to him. She hadn't covered the story herself, no, she'd been out of the country, but she knew…something. But what was it exactly?

“What if, in addition to the fire drills, the system had added a few extras, like watching out for the people in front of you, beside you and in back of you? What if the kids had to keep their eyes peeled for the source of the danger? What if they were allowed to do a little thinking for themselves?”

Corrie only understood one thing clearly: however Mack Dorsey came by his scars, they were earned not just at a physically painful level, but at the expense of a huge chunk of his very soul.

Her breath burned in her lungs.

His hands grasped her shoulders, as if he might shake the truth of his statements into her, but he only caressed her arms and looked deeply into her eyes. “Quietly exiting a burning building doesn't cut it.”

“But—”

“No buts,” he interrupted. “Everyone should be
running
for the exits. They should
hit
the doors with all the force they can,
slam
through them, and with their arms around their buddies. They should fly through those doors and drop and roll. I mean really drop and really roll. Fire drills shouldn't be an exercise in who has the quietest classroom, but in pure, hard survival.”

“You were burned in a school fire,” Corrie said.
She wished she hadn't spoken the moment the words came out of her mouth, but she couldn't retract them. Not physically, anyway.

“Yes,” he said. The answer was short, the emotion behind it, immense.

“I haven't asked where or how you came by your scars,” she said.

Whatever fury had driven him just seconds before, drained out of him as he gazed at her. “You haven't. You're incredible.”

“I'm not a reporter anymore, Mack. I'm not out for a story.”

“I know that. I don't know what you are, exactly, but I know
that.
”

Tears unexpectedly welled in Corrie's eyes. “I don't know what you are either, Mack. I just know I care.”

He tensed, ran a hand through his hair as if frustrated, but the look on his face spelled nothing but sorrow. “God, Corrie, I know that. And I care, too. Can't you see that? Can't you tell that it's driving me crazy?”