The Ties That Bind (28 page)

"And that messes with your little anal side." She wasn't being sarcastic.

"Totally."

"Well, I'm going to mess with it a bit more. Kase, you know there's stuff in the world that nobody can understand. Think about some of the stories Mom's told us about her work in Latin America. She told us she saw some stuff that logic couldn't explain."

"And then Dad would say it's just people creating what they want to see," I retorted, though I wasn't directing the comment at Kara. More at my own frustration with the whole situation.

She shrugged. "Dad's seen stuff, too. He just doesn't talk as much about it as Mom does."

Kara had a point. "So let's say that this weird stuff I've seen and been privy to is real and outside logical boundaries. What do I do with it?"

"Why do you have to do anything with it?"

I looked at her as if a third eye had appeared on her forehead.

She shook her head and her expression said to pity me. "Seriously. What's to do about it? Whatever this stuff is--whether it's Navajo witches or something your mind created in a moment of freak-out--why do you have to do anything about it?"

I studied the carpet, noting that its shade of blue brought out the turquoise splotches of Kara's chair. "I can't help thinking that it relates somehow to what's happening with Bill's death." I looked up and caught her eye. "And I hate that it's driving a wedge between me and Sage. I fucking hate that."

"Okay, wait," she said, leaning forward like a therapist might. "Let's say it
is
connected. We don't know how, yet, but forcing the issue isn't revealing anything except more stress--"

"So stop trying to force the issue." I finished for her.

"Something like that. And with regard to the wedge, that's a choice you make. If you let it create difficulties between you and Sage, then it will." She sat back, and her expression told me that she was waiting for me to respond with something typically K.C., like how I didn't need her lame counseling or existential observations. Instead, I smiled.

"You're right," I said, and it felt good to admit that.

"Oh, my God," she stage-whispered. "My older sister, the professor, just said I was right about something. I'm going to call Mom right now. And then nine-one-one." She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and waved it around dramatically.

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever," I muttered, staring at the floor again, a mixture of fatigue and stress clenching the muscles in my back.
This is such a train wreck.

Kara set her phone on the table and joined me on the bed. "Hey." She put her arm around my shoulders. The gesture made me want to cry. I bit my lip to stop the urge.

"Hey," she said again.

A single tear escaped my right eye.
Damn
. I bit my lip harder.

"Kase, come on. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you feel bad."

I sniffled and more tears welled in my eyes. "You didn't. And some hotshot professor I am, huh?" I wiped my face with the hem of my T-shirt. "I can't fucking make sense of anything anymore."

Kara pulled me closer. "Anybody would have a hard time with this whole thing. There's no manual for how to deal with possible supernatural phenomenon and the death of a father your partner has baggage about. It's not like you can Google that and find a solution. Or research it."

"I know that logically," I said between sniffles. "But I can't make it work emotionally. I don't know what the hell to do. I can't make this situation better. I can't make Sage feel better."

"That's so not true. You've been a wonderful support system for her. And Kase, you
can't
fix this. Bill's dead. Sage has to work that out for herself. All you can do is offer her a safe space to vent and freak out about it. There's nothing logical about that. It'll happen on its own time, and she'll figure it out."

I wiped my face again with my tee. "But what if while she's working on that she decides she's not into being in a relationship with me?"

Kara didn't say anything for a bit, and I looked up at her. "Jesus, Kase," Kara finally said and the tone of her voice made me cry a little more. "Sage loves you and she's not the type to throw something like that away just because she's working through some stuff."

"That's not a guarantee." To lose Sage would be like cutting out a giant chunk of my heart and skewering it over live coals.

"Maybe not. But here's the deal. If you conduct your life worried that the worst is going to happen, no matter the situation, then you'll drive a lot of people away. And that tends to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, anyway. You just need to keep showing up, and not run away. Sometimes that's the hardest thing to do."

I tried to swallow past the lump in my throat, but couldn't because Kara was right, again, and I remembered when my relationship with Melissa had unraveled in a similar way, with both of us withdrawing and me dreading that she'd leave but isolating myself further until she did. "Do you think maybe I subconsciously try to drive people away?"

Kara gave me a squeeze. "I don't know. Maybe. I do know that if you set up a scenario like that--Sage leaving--you're on your way to enacting it. So don't. Talk to her. And don't hide." She said it with a slight warning, making me think about Melissa, and what Chris had said about me burying myself in my work.

I scuffed my bare toes into the carpet and winced because they were still sore from my earlier idiocy.

Kara tousled my hair. "Now get your ass over to her room-- wait. I'm coming with you. Just let me get my stuff." She pulled away and stood up and went into the bathroom where I heard her rummaging around.

"What are you doing?"

She emerged from the bathroom and flashed me a look. "Kase, sometimes you are so dense. I'm trading places with Sage tonight. You need some alone time with her and I don't have a problem sharing a hotel room with a guy. River's family, anyway." She put her toiletry kit in the duffle bag I'd loaned her for this trip.

"But she wants to spend time with him." Kara raised an eyebrow at me and shook her head. "You need her now. She needs you. Tell her that."

"But--" I stopped.

"What? You called Chris to tell her about the day, and you told me what was going on. You're done with processing anything else today. So get out of your damn head, go over to your woman's room, and tell her that you need her right here, right now, and you won't take no for an answer."

I stared at her, half-amused and half-stunned. "My woman?"

"Semantics. Whatever you call her. Partner. Girlfriend. Love monster. Shut the hell up and go get her," Kara said with a smirk. She grabbed the duffle bag and opened the hotel door. Without another word, I followed her down the hall, thoughts a jumble in my head, but one stuck out front and center. I did need Sage. And I needed to tell her that.

Chapter Sixteen

I WOKE UP before the alarm went off and opened my eyes, wishing for another few hours in bed. Hell, another few days. Or weeks. Maybe we could sleep through this fiasco. I sighed. No deal. I was lying on my left side, facing Sage, who was on her right side, head propped on one arm. She came into focus, watching me. She smiled.

"Hey," I said, smiling back. "What time is it?"

"Seven." She reached over and brushed my hair out of my eyes.

"How long have you been up?" I caught her hand with mine and kissed her fingertips.

"A while."

"You okay?" I searched her eyes, looking for clues to her thoughts.

"Much better than I have been in a while." She leaned in and kissed me. "Thank you."

I waited for her to continue, tracing patterns on her hip with my free hand.

"I know that you feel things that you don't always voice."

"True," I agreed.

"But I don't want you to think that you can't say things to me, no matter how pissed off you are or upset. Sometimes I can't reach some of your deeper levels, and you have to tell me when you want me to see them."

I nodded, thinking about how I'd shut myself off from Melissa, and how the relationship had disintegrated in the midst of Megan's addiction, both Melissa and me struggling to cope with that, trying to be a support system for each other but failing. I had escaped into my research while Melissa sought comfort from another woman.

"Are you thinking about what happened with Melissa?" she asked, stroking my cheek.

I smiled again. "Yeah."

"I'm not Melissa."

"No. But I'm still me and I need to not do certain things. I'm just not sure how."

"The answer might not be here," she said as she touched my forehead. "It might be here." She ran her fingers down my neck and stopped at my heart. Chris or
Abuelita
would say
¿Qué dice tu corazón?
in a situation like this. And generally, they were right. If I couldn't find an answer in my head, maybe I should listen to what my heart was trying to say.

"It says I'm scared but I need you and I'll do everything I can to stay present and to not run away." I covered her hand with mine.

"I'm scared, too," she said, barely above a whisper. "And I need you more than you know." She looked at me, intent, and a strange, hot current seemed to flow between our hands, from hers to mine and back again, looping. I might have dismissed it as something I was imagining, but it had happened the week before, after the porch incident, and it had surprised me then. Now, as the sensation passed as quickly as it had begun, I felt comfort. I leaned in and kissed Sage, knowing that words were inadequate, and sometimes, letting things unfold was the best response.

The room phone rang and Sage groaned against my lips.

"Dammit. Our wake-up call." I sighed and pulled away, but Sage stopped me and kissed me again, long and gentle. The phone continued to ring. She nipped my lower lip as the kiss ended and the phone stopped ringing.

"I love you," she said. "Don't forget that." She stared at me for a while, until the phone rang again and she reached for it.

"I won't."

"Good." She flashed me a little impish Sage grin. "Good morning, Kara. K.C.'s about to get into the shower. We'll meet you at your room in a half-hour." She playfully nudged me with her foot to get out of bed. I planted one more kiss on her bare shoulder and threw the covers back.

"Tell her I expect a big, hot, cup of awesome coffee," I said as I headed for the bathroom.
And a day that goes by without any freaky shit happening
. I turned on the hot water and let it course over my skin.

"WELL, THAT WAS a fucking bust," I said as we left Ridge Star headquarters. I slid into the driver's seat while Kara got in on the passenger's side. We sat in silence for a bit, me both frustrated and relieved.

"Maybe not," Kara announced. "That's Clint Monroe."

I looked past her toward the entrance of Ridge Star headquarters, a bland cream-colored storefront on the eastern edge of town. A man wearing jeans and a light blue button-down shirt had exited the building and was getting into a big black pickup truck that was parked in front.

"You sure?"

"Yep. I found a promo photo of him on the web when I was looking for the Ridge Star phone number. And there's another picture of him on the wall in there."

"Guess he thought the coast was clear," I said as I put my sunglasses on.

"Must have," Kara agreed, but with an innocent tone that meant she was up to no good.

He backed the truck up and turned left onto the main road, headed east.

"Hmm. Now isn't that just a tad suspicious, how the receptionist told us he wasn't able to come in today after all." I started the engine.

"Just a tad." She shot me an expression that reminded me of when we were kids and Kara was about to propose something completely nuts that I'd nevertheless completely buy into. "Let's follow him."

I pulled into traffic, knowing that on any other day, I'd think this was insane. But given everything that had happened in the past week, it was perfectly natural to be tailing a guy with ties to an oil and gas company that just might be responsible for the murder of my girlfriend's dad.

"Hold up. He's turning again."

I slowed down, hanging back a bit as he turned onto northbound Highway 550, which would take him along the Animas River for a few miles through landscape that was a mixture of green river valley constrained within high desert buttes and hills littered with piñon trees, sage, and cactus. I turned as well, letting him get ahead of me a few hundred feet. "So what's your plan?" I asked after another thirty seconds passed and Monroe hadn't turned.

"I just want to see where he goes. Something's funky, since everybody back at Ridge Star said he wasn't going to come into the office today."

"Maybe it's the enviro-geek vibe you give off. They thought you might chain yourself to a rig out there on one of the mesas."

"Well, duh. Where else would I chain myself out here? A rock?"

"Save the rocks! Only three million years before they're worn to pebbles!" I said in a fake announcer voice. Kara smacked me on the thigh. "Ow. Damn. I'm trading you in on a new model."

"Good luck. I'm the prototype."

I laughed and directed my attention out the windshield, watching the tailgate of Monroe's truck. We weren't close enough for me to read the license plate, so I accelerated a little. "There's a little notebook and a pen in the glove compartment," I said as I closed the distance between my car and Monroe's. "Can you see his plate number?" I glanced over at Kara as she leaned forward and dug the items out.

"Not quite. Try to get a little closer."

"This would've been so much easier in the parking lot," I muttered as I pushed the gas pedal again.

"But then we wouldn't be able to play Nancy Drew. This is more interesting." She paused. "A little closer..." Kara opened the notebook and turned pages until she got to a blank one.

I sped up a bit.

"Yeah. Got it."

I slowed down, letting Monroe pull ahead again, still driving north on Highway 550. "I'm having a thought."