Black Hills (42 page)

“You should’ve told me. I had a right to know what was going on.”

“And if I had? You’d have wanted me to come back, and maybe I would have. With nothing. I’d’ve hated it. And I’d have blamed you sooner or later. Or you’d have given it all up and come to New York. And we’d have hated each other sooner. If I’d told you, Lil, if I’d ask you to stick with me until I made something, there wouldn’t be a Chance Wildlife Refuge. You wouldn’t be who you are now. Neither would I.”

“You made all the decisions.”

“I’ll cop to that. You agreed with them at the time.”

“I said I did because all I had left was pride.”

“Then you should understand that’s all I had.”

“You had me.”

He wanted to touch her, just his fingertips on her face, something to smooth away the hurt in her eyes. But it wasn’t the way.

“I needed to be someone, for myself. I needed something to be proud of. I spent the first twenty years of my life wanting my father to love me, to be proud of me. Just like my mother, I guess. He’s got a way of making you want that approval, then withholding it so you want it more, and feel . . . less, because it never really comes. You don’t know what that’s like.”

“No, I don’t.” She saw, so clearly, the boy she’d first met. Those eyes, those sad and mad eyes.

“I never knew what it was like to have someone care about me, for me, feel pride in me for anything until I came out here that summer to stay with my grandparents. After that, in some ways, it was even more important to get it from my own parents. From my father most of all. But I was never going to get it.”

He shrugged that off, something over, something no longer important. “Realizing that changed things. Changed me. Maybe I did get harder, Lil, but I started going after what I wanted, not what he wanted. I was a good cop, and that mattered. When I couldn’t be a cop anymore, I built up a business, and I was a good investigator. It was never about the money, though let me tell you it’s damn, fucking hard not to have any, to be afraid you won’t make the rent the second month running.”

She stared out over the canyon where the rocks rose in silent power toward the deepening blue of the sky. “Did you think I wouldn’t understand any of this?”

“I didn’t understand half of it, and I didn’t know how to tell you. I loved you, Lil. I’ve loved you every day of my life since I was eleven years old.” He reached in his pocket, drew out the coin she’d given him at the end of their first summer. “I’ve carried you with me, every day of my life. But there was a time I didn’t think I deserved you. You can blame me for that, but the fact is we both had to make our way. We wouldn’t have made it if we hadn’t let each other go.”

“You don’t know that. And you didn’t have the right to decide for me.”

“I decided for me.”

“And you can come back now, a decade later, when
you’re
ready? I’m supposed to go along?”

“I thought you were happy—and believe me it sliced up a part of me when I’d think about you going on, doing what you wanted to do, without me. Every time I’d hear about you, it was about the name you were making for yourself, how you were building the refuge, or off to Africa or Alaska. The few times I saw you, you were always busy. Heading off somewhere.”

“Because I couldn’t stand being around you. It hurt. Goddamn it.”

“You were engaged.”

“I was never engaged. People assumed we were engaged. I lived with Jean-Paul, and we traveled together sometimes if our work coincided. I wanted to make a life. I wanted a family. But I couldn’t make it work. Not with him, not with anyone.”

“If it makes you feel any better, anytime I heard about him, or about you seeing someone else, it killed me. I had a lot of miserable nights and days, hours, years, wishing I hadn’t done what I thought—still think—was the right thing. I figured you’d moved on, and half the time I hated you for it.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say, want me to do.”

“Neither do I. But I’m saying to you I know who I am now, what I am, and I’m okay with it. I did what I needed to do, and now? I’m doing what I want to do. I’m going to give my grandparents the best I have, because that’s what they always gave me. I’m going to give you the best I have, because I’m not letting you go again.”

“You don’t have me, Coop.”

“Then I’ll fix that until I do. If for now all I can do is help you, keep you safe, sleep with you, and make sure you know I’m not going anywhere, that’s okay. Sooner or later you’re going to be mine again.”

“We’re not who we were.”

“We’re more than we were. And who we are, Lil? Still fits.”

“It’s not all your decision this time.”

“You still love me.”

“Yes, I do.” She faced him again, studied him with eyes that were both clear and unfathomable. “And I’ve lived a long time knowing love isn’t enough. You hurt me, more than anyone else ever has, more than anyone else ever could. Knowing why? I’m not sure if it makes it better or worse. That’s not an easy fix.”

“I’m not looking for easy. I came out here because my grandparents needed me. And I was ready to let go. I expected to find you the next thing to married. I told myself I’d have to suck that up. I’d had my chance. The way I look at it, Lil, you had yours, too. Take your time if you need to. I’m not going anywhere.”

“So you keep saying.” She stepped back, started to turn toward the horses, but he took her arm, swung her back.

“I guess I’ll have to, until you believe me. Here’s one for you, Lil. Do you know how many ways love can hit you? So it makes you happy, or miserable? It makes you sick in the belly or hurt in the heart. It makes everything brighter and sharper, or blurs all the edges. It makes you feel like a king or a fool. Every way love can hit, it’s hit me when it comes to you.”

He drew her in to take her mouth, to give in to that endless ache while the wind swept the air with the perfume of sage.

“Loving you made a man out of me,” he said when he let her go. “It’s the man who came back for you.”

“You still make my knees weak, and I still want your hands on me. But that’s all I’m sure of.”

“That’s a start.”

“I have to get back.”

“You’ve got color in your cheeks, and you don’t look so tired now.”

“Well, yippee. That doesn’t mean I’m not pissed off at the way you got me out here.” She mounted her horse. “I’m pissed off at you in so many ways right now, on so many levels.”

He studied her face as he swung into the saddle. “We never fought all that much the first time around. Too young and horny.”

“No, we didn’t fight so much because you weren’t such an asshole.”

“I don’t think that’s it.”

“You’re probably right. You were probably just as much of an asshole back then.”

“You liked flowers. You always liked it when we’d go hiking or riding and the wildflowers were blooming. I’ll have to get you some flowers.”

“Oh, yeah, that’ll make everything just fine.” Her tone was as brittle as juniper in a drought. “I’m not one of your city women who can be bought off with a bunch of fancy roses.”

“You don’t know anything about my city women. Which probably sticks in your craw.”

“Why should it? I’ve had plenty of men . . . bring me flowers since you.”

“Okay, point for you on that.”

“This isn’t a game, or a joke, or a competition.”

“No.” But she was talking to him, and he considered that a check in the win column. “At this point, I have to believe it’s just destiny. I worked pretty hard on my life without you. And here I am, right back where I started.”

She said nothing while their horses waded through the high grass and back to the trailhead.

He waited until they’d loaded the horses, secured the tailgate. Behind the wheel, he started the engine and glanced at her profile. “I brought some of my things over. I’m going to be staying there, at least until they have Howe in custody. I’m going to bring some other things over tomorrow. I need a drawer, some closet space.”

“You can have a drawer and the closet space. Just don’t assume it means anything but that I’m willing to make it convenient for you, as I’m grateful for your help.”

“And you like the sex.”

“And I like the sex,” she said, very coolly.

“I’ll need to do some work while I’m staying at the cabin. If using the kitchen table doesn’t work for you, I need somewhere else to set up my laptop.”

“You can use the living room.”

“All right.”

“Are you not mentioning how James Tyler was killed because you think I can’t handle it?”

“There were other things I wanted to talk about.”

“I’m not fragile.”

“No, but it’s wearing on you. They’ll have to wait for the autopsy, but from what Willy said, his throat was slit. He was stripped down to his pants and boots—so I figure his killer thought he could use the shirt and jacket, the cap he’d been wearing. His watch, his wallet. He probably destroyed the cell phone, or Tyler lost it along the way. The killer must have had the cord he used on him. He weighed the body down with rocks. Went to some time and trouble to get it in the river, in that spot, secure it. But the rain shifted things enough to bring it up to the point Gull spotted it.”

“He’s probably disposed of other bodies with more luck.”

“Yeah, that would be my take.”

“So if he’s the one who killed Molly Pickens, he wasn’t dead or in prison like you thought, or not in prison for the length of time you thought. He’s just been mixing it up. Leaving some bodies for the animals, bodies that can be found or have been found. Hiding others.”

“That’s the way it looks.”

She nodded slowly, the way he knew she did when she was reasoning something out. “And killers who do this, serial types, who troll and travel, who know how to hide and blend, who have some measure of control, they aren’t always caught.”

“You’ve been reading up.”

“It’s what I do when I need information. They end up with creative names—and maybe a feature film. Zodiac, Green River. Still, they usually need to taunt the police, or use the media. He doesn’t.”

“It’s not about glory or acknowledgment. It’s about the work. It’s personal, and he gets his satisfaction from that. Every kill is proof he’s better than the victim. Better than his father. He’s proving something. I know what that’s like.”

“Did you become a cop to be a hero, Coop?”

His lips curved. “In the beginning? Yeah, probably. I was completely out of place during my short stint in college. Not just trying to find my place, but out of it. The only things I learned about the law were—I didn’t want to be a lawyer, but the law itself was fascinating. So, law enforcement.”

“Fighting crime in the urban canyons.”

“I loved New York. Still do,” he said easily. “And sure, I imagined I’d be hunting down bad guys, protecting the populace. I found out, fast, I’d be standing around a lot, sitting around, knocking on doors and doing paperwork. There’s so much tedium in proportion to moments of absolute terror. I learned to be patient. I learned how to wait, and what it means to protect and serve. Then on 9/11, everything shifted.”

She reached out, laid a hand over his, lightly, briefly. But it was all there in the touch. Comfort, sympathy, understanding. “We were all terrified until we knew you were safe.”

“I wasn’t on the roll that day. By the time I got down there, the second tower was gone. You just did what you had to, what you could.”

“I was in class when we heard a plane had hit one of the towers. Nobody knew, not at first, what was happening. And then . . . everything stopped. There was nothing else but that.”

He shook his head, because if he let them, the pictures would form in his mind again, of what he’d seen and done, and hadn’t been able to do.

“I knew some of the cops who went in, some of the firefighters. People I’d worked with, or hung out with, played ball with. Gone. After that, I never thought I’d leave the job. It was like a mission then. My people, my city. But when Dory was killed, it switched off for me. Just like somebody cut the wire. I couldn’t do it anymore. Losing that was the worst thing in my life next to losing you.”

“You could’ve transferred to another place.”

“That’s what I did, in my own way. I needed to build something back, I guess. To make something out of the death and the grief. I don’t know, Lil. I did what came next. It worked for me.”

“You’d still be there if Sam hadn’t had the accident.”

“I don’t know. The city came back, and so did I. I was done there, and I’d already put plans in place to come back before the accident.”

“Before?”

“Yeah. I wanted the quiet.”

“Considering what’s happened, you haven’t gotten what you wanted.”

He looked over at her. “Not yet.”

It was nearing dark by the time he turned onto her road. Long shadows at the end of a long day.

“I’m going to help with the feeding,” she said. “Then I have some work to finish up.”

“I’ve got some of my own.” He reached over before she could open the door, and cupped the back of her neck in his hand. “I could say I’m sorry, but I’m not, because here you are. I could tell you I’ll never hurt you again, but I will. What I can tell you is I’m going to love you for the rest of my life. Maybe that’s not enough, but right now it’s what I’ve got.”

“And I’ll tell you I need time to think, time to settle, and time to figure out what it is I want this time.”

“I’ve got time. I have to run into town. Do you need any supplies?”

“No, we’re good.”

“I’ll be back in an hour.” He tugged her over, pressed his mouth to hers.