Water Rites (19 page)
Authors: Mary Rosenblum
Tags: #Fiction, #Science Fiction, #General, #Collections & Anthologies
“I didn’t . . .” He stopped, felt himself blushing. The wine had gone straight to his head after his sleepless night.
Gwynn reached for his hand, patted it dry with a clean napkin. “I suspect she’s feeling you out for a deal. You’re the new water lord in town. The only reason she came to this party was to meet you.”
Carter stared at her, feeling stupid. “I don’t have the authority to make any flow changes.”
“You might have the General’s ear. If you don’t, don’t worry. She won’t bother you much longer.” Gwynn laughed, reached up and touched his cheek lightly. “What desert island did you grow up on? The Corps controls the
water
, remember? These little deals . . . get done.”
Carter leaned slightly away from her touch. “I’ve never paid much attention to politics,” he said stiffly.
“Oh, you’re too wonderful.” And she stood on tiptoes to kiss him lightly, briefly on the mouth.
“I should be getting back,” he said, and she made a face at him.
“So soon?” She smoothed a strip of tape over the shallow cut on his palm. “Just because my wineglasses bite?”
“I’ve got things to do.” He moved toward the door, feeling utterly out of place here. “Uh, thanks for having me.”
“Any time.” Her eyes sparkled with amusement. “I’ll have to give you a chance to drink my wine without incurring serious bodily injury.”
“Sure.” He edged toward the door.
“Fine.” Her smile widened. “That’s a promise then. How about next Friday?”
A waiter saved Carter by coming in to ask about more wine. Gwynn had to go down into the basement to show him and Carter used the opportunity to escape. The crowd had thinned out in the main room; people were leaving. He didn’t see Johnny anywhere, and felt a pang of disappointment. He had probably assumed that Carter had already left, and had left himself.
A set of French doors that opened onto a small side patio stood ajar and Carter went out that way. He’d parked the car on that side of the house. He closed the doors behind him and took out his cell phone to give Johnny a call, see where he’d taken off to.
Johnny was out here, standing in the shade under the eaves with Morissy. The Pacific Biosystems suit was tapping her index finger lightly on her palm, her shoulder’s stiff with authority. Johnny’s posture was . . . defensive. Carter’s toe caught a loose stone, and at the sound they both turned.
“Carter?” Johnny’s laugh was too bright. “Where did you run off to? I thought you’d gone.”
“We’ll get together later, Johnny.” Morissy gave Carter a cool smile. “Nice meeting you, Colonel, however briefly. Perhaps we can get together another time.” She walked briskly around the corner of the house and disappeared.
She looked pissed. Carter caught Johnny’s arm as he started from the doors. “Wait a minute.” He caught Johnny’s flicker of irritation, ignored it. “What was that all about?”
“A little offer of sex.” He smiled at Carter’s reaction. “They’re always fishing for a price, but that ain’t it. She wasn’t happy about my turn-down. I saw you in the kitchen with Gwynn.” His smile carried the faintest trace of a leer. “She has the hots for you, my friend. I can tell.”
“Are they leaning on you?” Carter asked softly. “Pacific Biosystems?” Water Policy members, with a life term, top pay, and no permissible business connections, were supposed to be beyond corruption. But water was power, Gwynn was right. “Johnny, I get the feeling something’s eating you.”
“It’s not.” Johnny took a deep breath. “Look, Carter, do you have any idea of the responsibility we have?” His voice had gone hushed and his face had gone pale, except for twin spots of color on his cheeks. “I was the boy genius economist — the bright and shining new star in the world of water and money — so now I have the real stuff. The real power. But you know me.” He grinned, a feeble stretch of his lips. “Sometimes I get . . . a little over the top.”
“Don’t I know it.” Carter gripped his arm hard. “How many times did we nearly get busted? What are you telling me?” His voice sobered. “Are you in trouble?”
“No.” Johnny’s face firmed and he smiled — a real smile this time, if a bit rueful. “I got a little drunk at a party and . . . did some things that might have been misinterpreted. Morissy misinterpreted them in spades. I’m not for sale.” He met Carter’s eyes. “Not now, not ever. But she’s being . . . awkward.”
“Blackmail?”
“No, nothing like that.” Johnny laughed, half angry. “I don’t put stuff into email or on paper, for that matter, give me a break.” He started down the graveled yard, toward the street and the parked cars. “No, it’s a nuisance, is all. The media could pick it up and throw rocks, but they won’t break any bones. I wasn’t kidding about Gwynn, you know.” He looked back over his shoulder. “She and I parted friends a long time ago. She’s a very hot lady, Carter. With money.”
“She’s very nice.”
“You got someone already?” Johnny’s eyebrows rose. “You never could play poker for shit. When did this happen?”
“Someone I just met, Johnny.” He tried to make his voice casual. “Nita. Nita Montoya.”
“Latino?” Johnny’s eyebrows rose as they reached the cracked sidewalk. “Well . . . congratulations, I guess. Is this, like, long term?”
“God, I don’t know, Johnny.” Carter heard the irritation in his voice, couldn’t help it. “You tell me. Listen, I’ve got to get back to the base. Can I drop you somewhere, or do you have a car?”
“You can drop me at my motel.” Johnny followed him to his car. “Tell me how you’re settling in up there.”
He didn’t tell Johnny much, but Johnny for once didn’t seem disposed to talk so that was fine. The swirling undercurrents of the party had left him uneasy, full of misgivings. You could be tempted. Anyone could be tempted. Gwynn had certainly been fishing this afternoon. He wondered what Morissy had on Johnny. Something, for all his disclaimer. When the time was right, he’d ask again, and maybe Johnny would tell him. But this wasn’t the time, and Johnny was vague about when they could get together again. Maybe tomorrow, he told Carter. If he didn’t have to bolt out of town suddenly.
It was late in the afternoon as he drove back to the base. The slanting beams of the sun touched the dusty land with gold and reflected from the random window in bursts of fire. He had checked in by phone and everything was quiet at the base. No trouble on the Pipeline. No one had even yelled at him as he drove the Corps car through town. Maybe he could keep this situation under control. Maybe it wasn’t another Chicago. Carter returned the guards’ salute as they waved him through the gate, anticipation stirring in his belly and groin.
He wanted to tell Nita about the party, hear her reaction. She had such a different perspective on this world. He wanted to tell her about Jeremy and his frog on the table. He might laugh. He had never seen her laugh, and he wanted to do that, suddenly — make her laugh. He parked in front of his apartment and hurried up the walk. Whatever would or wouldn’t work itself out between them, he wanted to see her
now
, to put his arms around her, bury his face in her hair and breathe the soft musky scent of her skin. The door was locked. He unlocked it and pushed it open. “Nita?”
Her name echoed through the apartment. He knew even as he shut the door. The sofa had been closed and the sheets lay neatly folded on it. He looked anyway, surveying the empty bedroom and bathroom.
She had not left a single trace of her presence behind, except for the folded sheets and the towel she had used. He picked it up, a lump heavy in his gut. Her scent rose faintly from the thick folds.
He threw it into the laundry hamper and tossed the sheets in after it.
Not strings attached, remember?
Part of him refused to believe it. She had a pass. She could walk through the door any minute.
She wasn’t going to. He knew it as surely as if she’d left him a note. She
had
left him a note — in the folded sheets and the empty apartment.
He wished now that he’d stayed at the fancy, freshly painted house. He wanted to get drunk with Johnny, tell him about Chicago and how it was his fault. And Johnny could tell him why Pacific Biosystems thought they could own him and they could laugh about it and maybe cry, like a couple of teenagers who couldn’t hold their liquor.
He didn’t call Johnny. He needed to go down to Operations and look over the flow reports himself, never mind that Delgado had already done it. He needed to review the day, check things out. He needed to think about the party gossip, and Dan Greely, and how they were going to put civilians on patrols without too many headaches. He walked through the apartment once more, checking to see if she’d left anything behind.
She hadn’t.
He didn’t slam the door on the way out.
CHAPTER NINE
N
ita looked around Carter’s apartment as she braided her hair. In the bright light everything looked too sharp, too vivid. It made her head ache. She tied off the end of her braid with a thin, silk ribbon David had given her.
Last night, alone in the darkness, it had been so easy to believe that he had walked away.
In the harsh light of day, she wasn’t so sure. Anything could happen. A man could break his leg and spend weeks healing in a farmhouse somewhere. He could run away and then change his mind. “I don’t know,” Nita whispered. The word sounded as loud as a shout in the silent apartment. She bent and yanked the sheets from the sofa bed. The faint scent of their lovemaking rose from the cloth as she folded them, and she bent her head, pierced by the memory of last night. I came in here because I was lonely, she told herself. That’s all it had been — a midnight need for comfort.
If that had been true yesterday, it was a lie now. She bent double over the armful of folded sheets, a stone of pain in her belly. “I love you, David,” she cried. “I do.”
On the bed, Rachel woke with a hungry cry. Nita threw the folded sheets onto the floor as Rachel began to wail. “Not your fault, love.” Nita calmed herself as she went to pick up her daughter. “I’m angry at me, not you. Have your breakfast and then we’ll go.”
This was where David would come to find her, so she would wait for him for awhile longer. But not here. Nita stared at the wall as her daughter nursed. She couldn’t stay here. She didn’t dare. When Rachel was finished, she repacked her pack, filled her water jugs, and tucked Rachel into her sling. Standing in the doorway, hand on the knob, she looked around at the empty rooms. She had spent one night here; less than twenty-four hours.
It felt familiar — as if she had lived here for days. Weeks. Nita thought about leaving Carter a note, but what could she say that wouldn’t be a lie, or be misunderstood? She bit her lip. Silence was best; he would understand that message. It was a message she had to give him.
And herself.
Nita yanked the door open and walked through it, out into the hot, dusty wind. A different guard was at the gate, a woman about Nita’s age. She eyed Nita suspiciously, but without the razor-wire feel of the man yesterday. She despised Nita a little, and Nita wondered why. She lifted her head, holding out the pass Carter had given her. It wasn’t until she had walked halfway down that dusty road that led to the truck plaza and the highway that she realized that she still had the pass; the guard hadn’t asked for it. Nita held it on her palm, half tempted to toss it into the dusty weeds that lined the road. But a part of her wanted to keep it, and she tucked it carefully into the pouch around her neck, trying to ignore the small prick of her guilt.
If she was going to stay in The Dalles for awhile, she would have to find a job. She was running out of scrip. Hitching the pack higher on her shoulders, tickling Rachel’s belly until she smiled and gurgled, Nita plodded through the afternoon sun toward town and the stores there. Maybe one of them had a job open.
“I’m sorry.” The round-faced, balding manager of the government store was genuinely apologetic. “I wish I could give you some kind of job.” He leaned on the counter, surrounded by aisles of controlled items: liquor, beer and wine, cigarettes, candy, a small meat counter, and shelves filled with other small, water-expensive luxuries that the government had loaded with restrictive taxes. “Have you tried Laurel, the manager down at the market? She might have a job for you cleaning out the booths or something.”
“I tried her.” Tired to the bone, discouraged, Nita shifted Rachel’s sling higher on her shoulder. There were no jobs in this town. She had been up and down the main street, asking at every store and fuel station, not just the market. “She’s got a kid working for her.”
“Oh yeah, her nephew.” The manager frowned, scratching at the brown spots that speckled his bare scalp “Things are real tight in town, what with the water cuts these past two years. The district supervisor’s been making noises about closing this store. Crazy, I say, because the nearest government store’ll be Bonneville, but hell, no one’s got scrip to spend except the truckers. All they buy is booze, and they’re mobile anyway. I had the news on this morning. Italy and Greece are blowing up the refugee boats coming over from Africa — just sinking ’em. Can you believe it?” He shook his head. “Hell, what’s happening to us? You’d think our humanity’s drying up with the water. Look, I got about an hour before closing.” He scowled at the clock on the wall. “You can polish the front windows for me and sweep out the back room. I’ve been meaning to get around to that for a week now. I can pay something for it.”
It was a handout — because of the news story. “Thank you,” Nita said. She’d take a handout.
“You’re looking for a job?” A man had come in from the street, tall and lanky with dark, graying hair.
“Hi, Dan.” The manager lifted a hand. “Nita here’s been trying to find something, but you know how it is. Dan Greely knows everyone.” He nodded emphatically. “If anyone can find you a job, he can.”
He was already regretting his offer of the sweeping job. Nita was too discouraged to be angry.
“I heard a woman was in town, looking for her husband. Is that you?” The newcomer leaned against the counter beside her.
“David Ascher. He was supposed to have a job here. He’s about your height.” She looked up, frowning. “He has curly black hair, only it’s starting to go gray.” The faint flicker of her hope died easily at the man’s headshake.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t heard of him. I might be able to help you out with a job, though,” he said thoughtfully. “I had a man working out at my farm. He left about three months ago, and I need some help. It’s field work, but I have an extra room in the house. All I can offer you right now is board and a share of the profit — if there
is
any profit this year.”
Nita considered, watching the man from beneath her lashes. The offer felt genuine, but the ride to Tygh Valley had made her wary. The man’s graying hair and his lined, sundried face put him in his forties, maybe more. About David’s age. He was staring at her, examining her face with a searching intensity that made Nita uncomfortable.
“Don’t I know you?” He sounded uncertain. “What’s your name, again?”
“Nita. Nita Montoya.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’re not . . . Sam Montoya’s daughter, are you?”
His sudden tension brought her head up. “Yes.” She eyed him warily. “He died a long time ago.”
“I know.” The man’s voice has hushed, muted by a flood of emotion. “I knew Sam. I even remember you. You must have been about four, last time I saw you.”
She had been five and a half on the day the men had come to kill her father. Nita took a step backward as Rachel began to whimper.
“Well, I’ll be.” The manager leaned over the counter, clucking with delight. “Sam’s youngest. I heard the name, even, but it didn’t click. He was a good man, your dad.” He nodded, light glancing off his spotted scalp. “We miss him, eh Dan?”
“Where did you go?” The man named Dan spoke as if he hadn’t heard the manager, as if he and Nita were the only people in the store, or the world.
She took another step backward, suddenly wanting to run, to put distance between herself and this stranger’s frightening intensity. “Mama . . . took us to live with my brother Alberto. Down in the Willamette Valley.” The door was right behind her. “Thank you for offering to let me sweep,” she told the manager. “I think I’ll check one or two other places first.” She escaped, the door banging shut behind her, out into hot, dusty safety of the street.
He followed her, stretching his long legs to catch up, his determination like a hot breath on the back of her neck, making her want to run.
“I’m sorry if I upset you. Nita? Want to slow down for a minute, before we both get heat stroke?” He sounded plaintive. “I won’t bite. I promise.”
“You didn’t upset me. Oh, all right, you did.” Nita stopped suddenly. She couldn’t outrun him, and it was too hot even to try. “I hadn’t really thought about it . . .” She wiped her sweaty face on her sleeve, groping for words. “That people here would have known my father, I mean.” The town and the dusty yesterday that she remembered were two different worlds. “It just . . . took me by surprise.”
“I’m sorry.”
He was. “Don’t be. It was a long time ago.” His name was Dan Greely, she remembered. “Mama never mentioned you.” She heard the accusation in her tone, watched his eyes flicker.
“I’m not surprised.” He sighed and pushed hair that needed cutting out of his eyes. “Maria never liked me much. She blamed me for Sam’s death.”
Grief? His emotion struck Nita like a blow.
“How is your mother?” he asked.
“She died three years ago.” Rachel’s sling was rubbing her shoulder and Nita tugged at the knot, uneasy again. This man remembered her father much better than she did and after twenty years, he still mourned him. “A spray plane crashed into the residence compound at the ag-plex. Alberto died, too,” she said. “I don’t know where Ignacio is. He took off.”
“I’m sorry,” Dan said softly. “Poor Maria. She never made peace with Sam’s choice. I don’t think she ever understood how much that choice cost him.”
Nita sneaked a look at his face, studying the weathered profile. “I don’t really know what you mean,” she said. “Mama never talked about The Dalles at all.” Except to blame her husband for dying and Nita for living.
“I was serious about needing a hand in the fields,” Dan said slowly. “I’ve been spending too much time with politics lately and the beans are suffering. I can’t guarantee that you’ll get much more than a place to live out of it, what with the recent water cuts, but you and your baby are welcome, if that suits.”
She wanted to say no and walk away from this man and the ghosts he raised, but she was tired. If she and Rachel were going to eat, she had to find a job. Already she was losing weight and Rachel’s fussing suggested her milk was failing. Nita sighed, liking the quiet feel of this man, ghosts or no ghosts. She felt no darkness in him, no threat. The ghosts would be everywhere, now that people knew who she was, she guessed. “I’ll take it.” She hitched the sling higher on her shoulder. “I’ve never worked beans, but I’ve worked bushes. I know how to pull weeds and run a soaker-hose system.”
“Great.” His smile warmed her like sunlight. “I’m glad to share with you. I’ll put the word out about your husband. I know a lot of folk around here. How old is your baby?” He tickled Rachel lightly under the chin, smiled with her drooly smile.
“This is Rachel. She’s six months old.” Nita had the feeling that she had made a good choice, had found a place to wait for David.
Or hide from Carter?
She shook her head to banish that thought. “I appreciate the job.”
“I appreciate the help.” He held out a hand. “Why don’t you give me your pack? Rachel looks like quite a load on her own. My truck’s parked at the market. I was just on the way home.”