Kitty Takes a Holiday

Chapter 17

We spent the morning replacing the tires on Ben's car. Then, he wanted to run an errand. He asked me to come along, and I did. He drove, and I didn't bother to ask where we were going or what he was doing until we ended up on yet another dirt track that led us miles into the desert. We stopped at the bottom of an arroyo, covered with tall scrub, more vegetation than I was expecting to find. Lots of places to hide. This was the kind of area where ranch­ers grazed herds of sheep, and where wolves liked to run.

I'd never been here, but I recognized it. He didn't have to tell me where we were. He stopped the car, shut off the engine, and looked out, staring hard. He gripped the steer­ing wheel like he was clinging to a lifesaving rope.

"Is this where it happened?" I said.

"Up past the curve there. Cormac drove the Jeep into the clearing. I don't really recognize it in the daylight."

I couldn't guess what he was thinking, why he'd wanted to come here. Wanting to come full circle, hoping to find closure. Something pop-psychological like that.

"You want to get out?" I said.

"No," he said, shaking his head slowly. "I just wanted to see it. See if I could see it."

"Without freaking out?"

"Yeah, something like that. I wondered if there'd be more to this place. If I'd feel something."

"Do you?"

He pursed his lips. "I think I just want to go home." He turned the ignition and put the car in gear.

On the way back to town I said, "I've never been back to the place where it happened to me," I said. "Just never saw much point in going back."

"That's because you've moved on."

"Have I? I guess it depends on what you call moving on. Sometimes I feel like I'm ru

"Do you want to go back? I'll go with you if you want to see it."

I thought about it. I'd replayed that scene in my mind a hundred times, a thousand times, since that night. I real­ized I didn't want to see the place, and it wasn't because I was avoiding it, or because I was afraid.

Ben was right. I'd come so far since then.

"No, that's okay."

We had lunch at a local diner before heading back to Colorado. We'd be carava

But he seemed okay. He was down, but not out. Some life had come back into his eyes over the last week or so. Even though we were leaving New Mexico with stories, but no hard evidence. Statements, but no witnesses. Noth­ing to keep Cormac out of court.

Ben slouched in his side of the booth, leaning on the table, his head propped on his hand. "Everybody he's killed—every thing he's killed—deserved it. I have to believe that. I have to convince the court of that."

With a sympathetic judge, a less gung-ho prosecutor, or just one person from Shiprock willing to come testify, this probably would all go away. Lawrence had called us lucky, and maybe we were, but only to a point.

What it all came down to in the end: Cormac had shot an injured woman dead in front of the local sheriff, and nothing we could say changed that. And my opinion of Cormac was definitely colored by the fact that the first time we met, he'd been coming to kill me.

"Cormac's not clean, Ben. We both know that."

"We've spent half our lives looking out for each other. I guess it blinds you. I know he's killed people. The thing is, you drop a body down a mine shaft far enough off the main drag, nobody'll ever find it. And nobody's looking for the people he's killed."

Like what Lawrence said about bodies in the desert. Every place had its black hole, where people disappeared and never came back again. It made the world a dark and foreboding place.

"That's how the pack took care of things," I said. "T.J. ended up dumped in a mine shaft somewhere. I hate it."

"Me, too." He stared at nothing, probably mentally reviewing everything we knew, everyone we'd talked to, every fact and scrap of evidence, looking for something he'd missed, waiting for that one piece to slide into place that would fix everything. The check arrived, and I took it—Ben seemed to not notice it. I was about to go pay it when he said, out of the blue, "I should just quit."

"Quit what?"

"The lawyer gig. Too complicated. I should go be a rancher like my dad. Cows and prairie."

"Would that make you happy?"

"I have no idea."

"Don't quit. It'll get better."

A slow smile grew on him. "I won't quit if you won't."

"Quit what?" Now I just sounded dumb.

"Your show."

I hadn't quit. I'd just taken a break, why didn't people understand that?

Because it looked like I quit. Because if I wasn't mak­ing plans to go back to it, it meant I'd quit.

"Why not?" I said, feeling contrary. "They have Ariel, Priestess of the Night, now. She can handle it."

"There's room for both of you. You love your show, Kitty. You're good at it."

We were both leaning on the table now, within reach of each other, our feet almost touching underneath. Prox­imity was doing strange things to me. Sending a pleasant warmth through my gut. Making me smile like an idiot.

It was getting very hard for me to imagine not having Ben around.

I bit my lip, thought for a moment. Gri

He didn't even hesitate. "And you're cute, smart, fu

I kicked him under the table—gently. "Flatterer."

"Whatever it takes to keep you coming after me when I go around the bend."

I touched his hand, the one lying flat on the table. Curled my fingers around it. He squeezed back, almost desperately. He was still scared. Getting better at hiding it, at overcoming it. But still scared, at least a little.

"Of course I will. We're pack."

He nodded, picked up my hand, brought it to his lips. Kissed the fingers. Then without a word he grabbed the check, slid out of the booth, and went to the front counter to pay.

Bemused, I followed.

Back in Walsenburg the next day, Espinoza was late for our meeting. The last meeting before the hearing. The last chance to convince him to drop the charges against Cormac. Ben had shaved, gotten a haircut, and looked as polished as I'd ever seen him. He had on his best suit this time. Even I put on slacks and a blouse and put my hair up. He paced along the wall with the window, in a conference room in the courthouse. Slowly, with measured steps. Not an angry, desperate, wolfish pacing. Just nerves. He held a pen and tapped it against his opposite hand, glanced out the window as he passed it.

I sat in a chair by the wall and watched him. He was a handsome, competent, intelligent, determined man. And none of that was enough to help Cormac.

The door opened, and the young prosecutor blazed in, like a general in wartime.

"Mr. O'Farrell, sorry to keep you waiting." He glanced at me, his look questioning.

Ben was right on top of things. "No problem. This is Kitty Norville, she's helping me with the case."

Espinoza nodded, and his smile seemed more like a smirk. "The infamous uninjured Kitty Norville."

"I heal fast."

"Real fast, apparently."

"Yeah."

"Too bad for Mr. Be

Of all the low, blunt, arrogant, shitty things to say…

"That kind of talk isn't really appropriate," Ben said, the picture of calm professionalism.

"Of course. I'm sorry, Ms. Norville."

My smile felt wooden.

"If you don't mind, I'd like to get moving on this," Ben said, handing Espinoza a written report.