Lynn peered through her scope, but saw nothing. Wildlife had begun to return to the field where she had slaughtered the coyotes, but she hadn’t seen any more of the wild dogs lately. She followed the path of the road with her scope, willing the tall grass to part and give her a clear view. A breeze snuck through the weeds and spread them far enough for her to see an unnatural shade of blue moving toward the house.
Lynn’s heart skipped a beat; her rifle barrel jumped. Strangers who walked the open road were dangerous. Mother had taught her that those who didn’t hide themselves believed they were the ones to be feared and were best dropped at a distance. Her finger clutched the trigger impulsively, but she let out a slow breath. The man had moved out of her sight behind the overgrowth of the ditch, but the breeze brought an alien sound to her ears.
Whistling.
“Can I come out now?” Lucy’s hesitant voice rose up from under the eaves. Lynn started and lost her grip on the rifle. The sweaty barrel struck the shingles and she reflexively covered her ears, but it did not go off.
“Lucy,” she hissed, “go in the house.” Lynn wiped her hands on her coat and repositioned the rifle. She didn’t hear the back door opening. “Lucy,” she growled, a little louder. “Inside. Now.”
Silence met her demand and a dark dread billowed in her stomach. “Lucy?”
“Who is making a song?” The little voice sounded curious, yet cowed. “You don’t do that.”
Lynn was off her elbows and down the antennae in a moment, rifle clutched in the crook of her arm. Keeping the man in her sights and her aim steady was impossible with Lucy standing in the open, every step bringing the stranger closer to spotting her. She grabbed the little girl by the elbow and yanked her inside, Red Dog trailing from her other hand. When she turned right at the landing instead of heading down the stairs, Lucy quit protesting and clutched Lynn in return, the strangeness of going into the upper levels of the house quieting her.
Lynn headed for the living room, where the two front windows looked out onto the road only ten feet away. She silently raised the window enough to slide her rifle barrel under. Lucy crouched beside her, eyes wide.
The whistling was much louder now. He came into view slowly, hobbling on bare feet over the patchy gravel road, hands jammed into his pockets against the slight chill of the breeze. Lynn could see the stark outlines of his meager muscles under the thin covering of his goose-bumped skin. Still he whistled, each shuffling step falling in time with the tune he forced between his teeth though it seemed it was a struggle even to breathe.
Lynn took her own breath, exhaled partway and stilled her chest, eye to the scope. Suddenly she was very conscious of Lucy’s hand on her arm, the warmth of each tiny finger seeping into her skin.
“He looks lonely,” the little girl said, and Lynn let out the rest of her breath in a rush, pulling away from the scope.
“Of course he’s lonely,” she snapped. “He’s alone. Now I need you to be quiet and not touch me for a minute.”
Lucy’s grip on Lynn’s arm tightened. “You’re not gonna shoot him, are you?”
“I . . .” Lynn looked down at Lucy, her blue eyes wide and questioning, Red Dog tucked protectively under her elbow. “This is what I do, Lucy,” she said softly. “This is how I keep us safe.”
“But he didn’t hurt us,” Lucy said, bewilderment bringing her fine eyebrows together over her tiny nose. “He hasn’t done anything wrong.”
“We don’t know that.”
Lucy’s lower lip stuck out in an expression Lynn knew all too well. “Then ask him.”
“What?”
“I’m not letting you shoot him ’til you know he’s a bad man.”
“You’re kidding.”
Lucy crossed her arms and raised one eyebrow imperiously at Lynn, the strongest echo of Neva she’d seen in the child yet.
The whistling had stopped. Lynn glanced out the window and saw that the stranger was standing directly in front of the house, his gaze riveted on the freshly cut woodpile. “Looks like he knows we’re in here already,” she said. “You stay inside.” Lynn tapped her finger on the end of Lucy’s nose with every syllable for emphasis.
The front door hadn’t been opened in years, and the hinges groaned as she pulled it inward, heart in her throat. The porch was covered with piles of rotting leaves, years of debris left to decay. Lynn stepped around them, her attention hooked on the stranger’s face. He had jumped at the sound of the door but now stood hunched against the chill, eyes wary and trained on her rifle.
Her stomach clenched in apprehension before she spoke, every muscle in her body straining to stop her tongue from breaking Mother’s rules. “Where you headed?”
He looked away from the gun and up to her face, then jerked his head to the west. “That way, I suppose,” he said.
Lynn licked her lips to hide her irritation. “Why that way, is what I’m asking, and I think you know it.”
A small smile played with the man’s lips and she noticed that though his face had fine lines on it like Stebbs, his hair was solid brown with no traces of gray. “I’m headed that way because it’s the opposite of the direction I come from,” he said. “And I’m in a hurry to get away from there.”