Widowmaker (Mike Bowditch #7)(36)

Cabot fingered the beads of moisture on his beer glass absently. “We enjoy a pint together.”

“She said you call yourselves the Night Watchmen,” I said.

“In jest,” said Partridge.

“I don’t get the joke.”

“We all own homes on the mountain,” said John Cabot by way of explanation. “The irony in my case is that I don’t even ski. But my wife and her children can’t get enough of it. We have an interest in protecting our property values. That’s all there really is to it.”

“Protecting your property values from what?” I asked.

“Fugitive sex offenders!” said Partridge.

Cabot raised his pint glass. “Touché.”

Torgerson leaned over the table. “I have to go.”

He didn’t wait for a reply from them. Nor did he leave any money for the bill. Maybe the Night Watchmen ran a monthly tab.

“Are you sure you won’t sit down?” said Partridge. “I wrote about your father, you know. Horrible thing, and so embarrassing for you, as a warden. I am curious to hear what your life has been like over the past years.”

For another column? “Thanks for the invitation, but I need to get on the road. Nice meeting you gentlemen.”

Cabot and Partridge silently raised their glasses to me and didn’t speak a word to each other while I made my way to the door.

Well, that was a first, I thought. Usually when you are being threatened, you have some clue as to why.





14

The sky was as white as the slopes now. It was a cold, dry, nearly weightless snow, beyond the ability of the snowcats to shape. Skiers zoomed along the trail beside the lodge—momentary flashes of color—and then were swallowed up again by the silent storm.

The powder came off my truck with the faintest push of my gloved hand. I didn’t bother getting out the scraper. I started the engine and watched my breath, my life, unfurl into the cold before my eyes.

Had Officer Russo deliberately tried to bully me away from Widowmaker—or was he just another ham-fisted rent-a-cop? Did the Night Watchmen really suspect I had a secret relationship with the Langstroms that threatened them somehow—or were they just the drunken old busybodies they admitted themselves to be?

The phone buzzed in my pocket. When I saw that it was Stacey’s number, I felt my pulse begin to ease. The calmness lasted all of two seconds.

“You *!” she said. “You lying son of a bitch! Did you think I wouldn’t hear what really happened, Mike? You had a ‘scuffle with a tweaker’? Is that warden code for being stabbed in the back?”

“I’m sorry, Stacey. I didn’t want to worry you.”

“You lied to me.”

“I lied by omission.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Her nose still sounded plugged up. “My dad told me you could have died. He said every cop in the county came to the scene because they thought you were bleeding out.”

Of course I should have anticipated that her father would have heard the news of my stabbing. Charley Stevens had been the worst gossip in the Warden Service before he retired, and he was even worse now that he was uninhibited by department politics. The old pilot had sold me out to my girlfriend—not that I could blame him.

“It wasn’t that bad,” I said.

“That’s not the point.” She began to suffer a coughing fit. “You need to tell me what happened, Mike, or I swear to God, I’m going to come down there tonight and kick your lying ass.”

“I let a woman named Carrie Michaud get the drop on me. She’s this little ninety-pound drug addict, and I didn’t take her seriously enough. She stabbed me in the back, but the blade didn’t puncture my vest. She did manage to cut me in the arm before I subdued her. I only needed ten stitches.”

“You only needed ten stitches? And what do you mean, you subdued her? You didn’t shoot her?”

“I didn’t need to. I knocked her out.”

“If it had been me, I would have shot her!”

“Where are you?” The question slipped out before I realized how it might sound.

“Ashland. We got grounded by the snow. Where are you?”

“I’m not sure you want to know.”

“I am so going to kick your ass.”

“I’m at Widowmaker.”

She coughed some more. “What?”

“DeFord said I should take some sick days, but since I felt all right, I thought I would drive up to ask around about Adam. I told you I was coming here in my e-mail this morning.”

She fell silent for a moment before launching her second offensive. “Ever since that woman showed up at your house and told you about your brother, you’ve been on this downward spiral.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” I argued, despite the black thoughts that had been plaguing me only minutes earlier.

“It’s your dad, isn’t it? You’ve let him back into your head again. Jesus, Mike, get a grip!”

“I can explain everything if you just calm down.”

“Don’t talk to me like that. You should have called me from the hospital. If you don’t understand how much that breaks my heart, there’s nothing more to say. I’m not interested in being with someone who’d rather be lonely than be loved.”