Authors: Katie French
We move Bennett and his father into a little rock crevasse. Clay slides loose rocks over the opening to discourage scavengers and then lingers around the bodies for a while. I head back to the Jeep to see if Ethan’s awake. Walking past the man I killed makes my legs go to jelly. The blood pool has seeped into the dirt, but as I walk past, his moccasin gives a twitch. I jump in the Jeep and focus on keeping food in my stomach.
Clay leans against the Jeep tailgate. His face is ashen and slack. When he spots my brother, he frowns. “Why’s he still out?” It’s his turn to put his hand on Ethan’s chest.
I shrug. “His breathing’s regular. His pulse is fine. I think he got a heavy dose of those damn tranqs.”
“Didn’t we all? Goddamn that Bennett.”
“Yeah,” I say, clutching my knees. “How’d you find us, anyway? Last I saw, you were face down on the rug.”
Clay leans against the side of the Jeep. He tracks a vulture that’s already circling. “When I came to and you were gone, I had a pretty good idea of what happened. I followed your tracks for a while. When those disappeared, I took a chance that they’d be trading to the Riders. It’s a pretty regular post.”
My eyes narrow. “Wait a minute. You’ve traded with the Riders?”
Clay turns his eyes to the rise of buttes in the north. The pain’s written on his face.
Now I remember all the reasons not to trust Clay.
Around us the sounds of dusk start up, the shrill insects, a howl of a predator, filling in the gaps created by our awkward silence.
Clay breaks it. “Your brother looks a lot like mine.”
My eyes trace the line of Ethan’s mouth as it moves in his sleep. “You left your brother behind?”
“Nope,” he says, throwing a rifle over his shoulder and turning toward the ridge. “He died.”
Chapter Twelve
Night falls. Ethan won’t wake. The worry sits on me like a soaked comforter. I spend the time while Clay’s gone checking Ethan’s pulse over and over.
When the moon’s big and yellow in the sky, Clay returns with a musk hog, dead and dangling over his shoulder. He drops it with a thump into the dirt and sets the rifle in the passenger seat.
“Where’d you get the pig?” I ask, sliding forward on the tailgate, the metal ridges pushing into my knees.
Clay shrugs. “Found him rooting along the ridge. When I’ve got the bullets, hunting’s as easy as picking food off the ground.” He flicks out his hunting knife and begins to butcher the hog. He deftly slices the blade up the pig’s belly, releasing a mess of blood and guts. I wrinkle my nose at the warm, wet smell of animal innards.
I slip out of the Jeep and stand over him, watching. “That’s what I don’t get. How come you’re such a crack shot and those Riders weren’t worth a damn? They didn’t stand a chance.”
Clay’s making quick work of the pig. He strips the skin and sets to work on the haunches.
He keeps his eyes on the hog as he talks. “Road gangs are all the same. Big on guns. Short on one little thing.” Clay pauses and squints up at me. “Bullets. These gangs don’t got a handful of lead between ’em. Even if they get a shipment, they’ve never had enough to practice with. Couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn.”
He saws through more of the musk hog, his hands smeared red. He wipes them on a cloth and squints out at the last strip of light in the west. “My pa kept us eye-deep in lead. Said he rather go short on whiskey than ammo. And my pa loves whiskey.” He pauses, wipes his forehead with his shirt sleeve. “Pa used to take me out and we’d shoot all day. Wouldn’t let me quit till I could hit a bottle at 300 yards.” His face tightens. Then he stands, wipes his hands and pops the kinks out of his back. He digs through his pack and hands me a flint. “Start the fire, will ya? Can’t burn her long, but I won’t eat raw hog.”
I set off to gather scrub brush and branches. It’s a good excuse to mull over everything he said. As I pick up the scrub, I think about Clay’s father-son target practice sessions. Did the Sheriff smile and pat his son on the back when he blew a bottle into little glass shards, or did he backhand him when he missed? Somehow I can’t imagine them smiling, sharing a flask of homemade whiskey and whistling on the way home.
Above the ridge, the moon highlights the rocky peaks against deep valleys of shadow. The coyotes howl mournfully in the distance. It’s been a while since I’ve spent a night in the desert. I’ve forgotten how cold it gets when the sun goes down. I gather my armload of prickly shrubs and hurry back to where Clay’s set up camp. The stars begin to spread out before us, pinpricks of light in the dark blanket of sky.
Once the fire’s going, we set to work building a spit and setting the meat over it. Clay and I sit before the budding fire and warm our scraped and numb hands. I shoot a glance at Clay. He’s abnormally quiet and fidgety. The flickering glow highlights his cheeks a ruddy orange. His look is distant, his eyes wrinkled at the corners as if he’s still pondering all he left behind.
Now’s my chance to unravel some of this boy’s mystery. I take a deep breath and try to sound causal. “What was town life like?”
Clay eyes follow the dancing tongues of flame. “Easy most days. Hard on others.”
“What’d you mean?” I run my hands over my arms and watch the fire burn up my scrub brush. The smaller twigs pop and bend as the flames consume them.
He leans back against a rock, his hands laced behind his head. “Being the Sheriff’s brat made life easy as pie. We had fresh meat, books, toys— a lady to housekeep. I had my own bike, a red ten-speed with a bell. I’d pop wheelies and tool around town all day on that puppy.” He smiles. Then his face darkens. “Then I turned thirteen and my pa said it was time to man up. Taught me the trade.” He says trade like it’s a dirty word.
“What’d you have to do?”
Clay glances at me, his brow creasing. “Pa took me on raids. Had me sit in the car when he did business with the Riders and other gangs. At first I thought it was exciting, you know, fun to travel around, watch my pa do business. People talked to him like he was the Almighty. They’d give me gifts. One man made his boy give me his lunch. I’ll never forget the look on that kid’s face when he handed over the sack. Looking back, he probably hadn’t eaten in days.” Clay turns his eyes to the moon, his frown deepening.
“What then?” I ask, picking up a stick to poke the fire.
Clay sighs, big and heavy. “Well, then I turned fourteen, my brother died. After that, my dad didn’t just want me to do ride-alongs anymore. He gave my shootin’ irons,” he says, caressing the silver revolver slung on his hip with the pads of two fingers. “Made me get my hands dirty.” He looks down at his palms. Then he clasps them together so tightly the knuckles whiten. I flick my eyes away as he looks over at me.
“What you want to know all this for?” he asks, throwing more scrub on the fire. “You know what they say about the curious cat.”
I blush and shrug. “Just wondering what goes on under that ten-gallon hat of yours.”
He throws more wood on the fire until the flames soar and the heat cooks my shins. “I know what you’re thinking,” he says. “I shoulda lit out. It took me too damn long, but I done it, so you don’t need to judge.”
I look down at the holes in the knees of my jeans and pick at some of the loose strings. “I’m not.” There’s one more question burning at the back of my brain. Should I ask? I squeeze my hands at my sides. “Who’s Kody?”
He shoots me a glance that chills my insides. He opens his mouth as if to speak. Then closes it, stands and stalks off.
I’ve broken the quiet moment. My eyes flick to the fire that’s eaten up most of the scrub and sunk into a few guttering flames. The night air grips me. I hug myself and feel deeply alone again.
Movement. Clay’s back, standing at the edge of the circle. He’s breathing hard, as if he were running. His eyes are wild. He seems to have trouble getting the next words out. “I’ll say this once and then I never want you to ask me again.”
I nod.
He takes a deep breath and steels himself. “Last month my pa made me take a twelve-year-old boy to the Riders. The kid …” His jaw tightens. “The kid wet himself when I carried him to their truck.” He looks into my face, his eyes shining with unshed tears. “He cried my name as they drove away.”
“Kody,” I whisper.
Clay sniffs and stares into the dancing blue and orange flames of the fire, the veins tight cords on his neck. “I’ll see his face forever. Knowing what I did to him …” He curses and tugs at his hair angrily. Then he lifts his sorrowful face to me. “That day I swore I’d never trade another human being. That I’d get out.”
I pull my knees up to my chest and think about Clay handing over the boy to the Riders. It’s awful. Then again, if my dad was the Sheriff, would I have done any different? Having Arn’s death on my hands is bad enough, but I didn’t actually kill him. What must it be like for Clay to carry that kind of guilt around?
The raw emotion hangs over the fire like a cloud. For several moments we sit in silence as the fire dies down. The hog legs emit a delicious aroma, but right now I don’t feel like eating.
Finally, Clay walks forward as if unstuck. Some of the wildness has fallen off him. “We need to eat,” he says handing me my portion of meat.
I take it from him. My stomach grumbles at the smell. Maybe I can eat.
Clay kicks dirt over the fire until it sizzles. “Come on. We’ll eat in the Jeep.”
We slide into the Jeep, Clay in the driver’s side, me in the passenger seat. Normally, I’d fuss. It’s my Jeep. But, surprisingly, I don’t mind. Maybe I’m starting to trust Clay. Maybe I’m grateful he’s rescued us again. Either way, I’m looking over at Clay and smiling as he’s carefully holding the hot meat with the pads of his fingers. I shouldn’t trust this much. I’m worth enough for even a good man to lose his scruples. I pull the zipper on my coat all the way up to my throat.
I check on Ethan. He’s tucked into the back of the Jeep, the blanket I curled around him still in the exact position I placed it. He better wake up tomorrow or we have real problems.
I’m thinking about Ethan when Clay’s voice cuts through my thoughts. “Your turn.”
“Huh?”
“You didn’t think that back story was free, did ya?” He’s smiling for the first time in a while. “Your turn to answer my questions.” He takes a bite of his hog leg, the grease shining on his lips and chin.
I concentrate on not burning my fingers on my own leg, unable to meet his gaze.
“Let’s see,” he says. “Where to start? How about explaining your aunt to me. She seems … interesting.”
“Auntie’s wonderful,” I say, a bit indignant. Then I think of her bashing the cupboard to capture the bat. “She’s a bit off, but she loves us. She makes fantastic cornbread.” I take a bite of the leg and the savory roasted meat fills my mouth. I don’t realize I’m smiling until I wipe the corners of my mouth on the sleeve of my jacket. How long has it been since I’ve smiled like this?
“How’d you keep your ma a secret for so long?” Clay eyes trace a falling star streaking across the dark blue sky.
The smile drops from my face. This question is not one I want to answer. It touches too close to my secret.
“Oh, you know, traveling around a lot.” My next bite is huge, filling my mouth.
“Had to be more than that,” Clay says, watching me. “Breeders have spies everywhere. Had to be hard to keep her hid.”
I turn my eyes to the stars and note the constellation Andromeda. My mother called her the chained lady. Where is my mother tonight?
“We did everything we could to keep her free. In the end it wasn’t enough, was it?” Now it’s my turn to slip my eyes away, the emotion welling up, choking me.
Clay’s eyes linger somewhere in the stars. “I lost my ma, too.”
“What happened to her?” I ask, shifting to face him.
He sighs, still looking up. “I was too young to remember, but my pa said the Breeders just came for her one day. Said if he didn’t give her up, they’d kill the whole town. Guess they pack a lot of firepower, weapons we ain’t even seen. So,” he blows out his breath, “he gave her up. My pa don’t get emotional, but sometimes I see him lookin’ out and I know he’s thinking about her, the only woman he ever cared about.”
I nod and let the silence hang around us. We sit and look out at the stars and think of our mothers. Could they be together? The thought gives me a little comfort.
Clay turns to me, his face set in reassurance. “We’ll get to your ma.” His voice is so kind.
I nod. “Yours, too.” There it is again, that warm feeling that floods me when he gives me that look—eyes sparkling, smile comforting. A burn runs up my cheeks.
I miss the first words Clay says as my thoughts spin. “Huh?”
“I said, what’s it like being a bender?”
I scan Clay’s face for malice, but he’s just curious. I’m curious about benders, too, never having met one. I swallow hard. “People don’t look at you the same. It’s pretty … lonely.”
Clay finishes his hog leg. He chucks the bone off in the distance. He scoots down in the driver seat, a revolver over his lap and stares sleepy-eyed over the moonlit landscape. “Good talk, but I’m tuckered. Can you take the first shift?”
He falls asleep within seconds, his hat down over his face, his revolvers hugged tight to his chest.
I let my eyes wander to the crescent moon hung in the sprinkle of stars. Alone with my thoughts again. I expect that they’ll turn to Mom or Auntie, but they keep turning to Clay. The way his mouth turns up in his sleep. The moonlight in his brown hair. Before I know it, I’m watching the rise and fall of his chest. I turn my eyes to the road and try desperately not to think of the boy murmuring softly beside me.
Chapter Thirteen
I wake to a strange sweet smell, distant and musky. I nuzzle closer, my cheek rubbing against the warmth. It smells like home.
My eyes flicker open. My face rests on the soft suede of a worn leather jacket. It rises and falls rhythmically. My eyes fly wide open. My cheek rests on Clay’s chest, my body pressed to his across the Jeep seat.
I snap upright, the panic skidding through me. What’ve I done? I was supposed to keep watch, not cuddle. My jerking wakes him and he blinks at me.