Jake felt a sympathetic burn in his own veins.
“I think,” she started, voice careful in a way he hadn’t heard before, “that I’m not the team leader. So it doesn’t matter what I think.”
“Bullshit. I’m not asking as your team leader.”
She tipped her head from side-to-side, fingers tightening on her biceps. “I haven’t spoken to either one of them, you understand.”
“Yeah. But you can’t tell me you don’t have an opinion.”
She hesitated, scrutinizing him. He hadn’t known before that she was so cautious; he wondered if she knew how much of herself she revealed by holding back.
“I think,” she said at last, “that a person isn’t a weapon. And there’s no reason they want her other than that: to use her. I think she deserves better than that.”
“Yeah,” Jake said grimly.
“But that’s not my place to think or say. So.” She shrugged and turned to the counter, the going-cold coffee sitting in the pot there. “We have our orders.”
And they did.
30
Farley was typical of western towns abandoned once cattle ranching became more mechanized, then slowly rebuilt, caught in the middle of a refurbishment that lifted up each old relic one at a time. The VA center occupied a two-story, L-shaped corner building that had once been a mercantile store; it still bore the name Weston’s in colored tile just inside the front door. The offices occupied the top floor, and the rooms where counselors offered private meetings with vets who wanted or needed them.
The bake sale was being held downstairs, in a wide room with stacks of plastic chairs along the wall: the group meeting room, Rooster thought, and felt a prickling of unease up the back of his neck. He wasn’t going to stay for the meeting after, he told himself over and over – but he knew that he probably would. He’d do anything if Red looked at him adoringly.
He was currently holding up a brick pillar, one eye on the door, the other on the horseshoe of folding tables where the veteran’s wives, and Red, had set up a feast of baked goods and were happily selling them to the families of Farley.
He watched a woman touch Red’s shoulder and say something to her that made her smile. Saw another put an arm around her in a brief, encouraging hug. Saw Vicki watch her handle a sale with a warm, maternal smile of such obvious pride it nearly took his breath. How kind they all were to her; how welcoming and warm, when they had no reason to be.
It eased the knot of tension in his chest to see so many treat his girl the way she deserved. Like a normal person worthy of love and acceptance; like the sweet soul she was.
He was so absorbed in his gratitude for the women of this city that he didn’t hear anyone approach, and suddenly Jack was beside him, taking a deep breath that Rooster figured was more for his benefit than because the old man was actually tired.
Rooster jumped a little, but Jack didn’t comment. Just said, “Pretty big turnout.”
“Yeah.” He swallowed down the last of his startle response. “Should raise good money, yeah?”
“Oh yeah. The town likes to take care of its own.” He nodded toward Red. “Your girl looks right in her element.”
“Yeah.”
“She’s a real sweetheart. Vicki’ll miss her company if y’all decide to move on.”
Rooster spared the old man a sideways glance. “If?”
Jack slumped back so his shoulder rested against the pillar beside Rooster’s. “Oh, you know. If you decide you’re tired of being drifters and want to stay.”
Rooster’s stomach clenched tight in automatic response. Run, run, run, that old voice chanted in the back of his head.
“It’s not a bad place to settle down,” Jack continued, oblivious to Rooster’s mental implosion. “It’s not fancy, but you could find work. So could Red. There’s even a community college if she wanted to take some classes. They just put in a five-screen movie theater last year. There’s the farmer’s market, and the new Albertsons. We’re really moving up in the world.” He sent Rooster a considering look. “Might be worth a thought, at least.”
“Yeah,” Rooster said woodenly.
But even as panic roared in his ears, stronger than his pulse, he allowed himself a moment to consider it. A little house with a yard big enough to start a garden: vegetables, and flowers, and fruit trees with pale blossoms every spring. Red could go to school, sit in chilly classrooms with other students her age, learn about dead presidents and the life cycle and how to diagram a sentence. He could get a nine-to-five, break his back on a construction site, help build a Kroger to compete with the new Albertsons. On the weekends, they’d go sit on Jack and Vicki’s porch. Or some other neighbor’s. Sweet tea, and the chirrup of cicadas, and shadows growing long on the grass. They could go to Cody, and see the rodeo. Red could build a whole wardrobe of fringed leather and dusty cowboy boots.
He saw it all in the span of a blink: normalcy. And maybe, maybe, during the long winter nights, with snow blanketing the flat Wyoming fields, he would pull Red to him and–
He cut off that line of thought abruptly. No, he couldn’t betray her trust that way. Couldn’t let his shameful fantasies intrude on their bond.
But he’d seen the possibilities. And they were sweet, and tempting as cool water on a hot day. The mirage of sanctuary. Safety. Happiness.
“Just think about it,” Jack suggested.
But that was the problem: he already had.
*
“This is good.” So good, in fact, that Rooster popped the last corner of his iced pound cake into his mouth without bothering to be mannerly about it.
Red glowed with pride.
“I told her she’s a natural,” Vicki said, smiling fondly at Red as she passed. “Give her a little more practice, and she could open her own bakery.”
Red blushed furiously and looked down at her boots.
The cake turned to lead in his throat, and Rooster struggled to swallow it. Yeah, a bakery, because he could keep her safe there.
“Have you decided about the meeting, honey?” Vicki asked as she was packing empty Tupperware into a tote bag, and Rooster realized two things.
One: Vicki was talking to him.
And two: people were unstacking chairs and setting them up in two rows that faced a wooden podium.
The meeting was starting.
His gaze darted between the men who’d begun to shuffle into the building: most of them older, a few of them his age, one or two even younger. Tidy hair, and straight backs…save for those with noticeable limps; but even those boys held themselves with pride.
He could have picked a military man out of a lineup from ten yards away, and here were a whole pack of them. Talking quietly with one another, some of them laughing. He smelled fresh coffee, and a few of the wives were laying out the bake sale leftovers on a low folding table against the wall.
“I…” he started, and couldn’t get any other words out. He was petrified, suddenly. He couldn’t sit down and put his back to the door like that. Couldn’t be vulnerable. Couldn’t…
But Red was looking up at him with so much hope.
Jake stepped through the front door, Spence at his side. He stood on the Weston’s tile at the entrance and looked toward Rooster; nodded.
“You don’t have to,” Red said.
But he thought maybe he did. Maybe he ought to.
“If it’s okay,” Vicki said, casually, “the girls and I are gonna borrow Ruby for just a bit and go get some supper. You can walk up with the rest of the guys for milkshakes after.”
He took a series of deep breaths, hands curling and relaxing. Looked at Red, helpless. “I have to keep you safe.”
Vicki overheard him. “Honey, it’ll be safe as houses. We’ll be just up the street at Morton’s Diner. Okay? And there’ll be a whole bunch of us. We won’t let anything happen to Miss Ruby.”