Shelter Mountain (Virgin River #2)(115)

“He’s a good friend of mine,” Preacher said. Paige came around him and Preacher lifted his good arm to drop it over her shoulders, the other dangling at his side, blood running down it.

Jim made eye contact with each of the men and Paige, one at a time. “I hit this guy in the back of the head, okay? We all good on that? Because your cowboy buddy there—I think he’s not what he appears to be.”

“Shouldn’t the law decide that?” Jack asked.

Jim Post had been undercover in these mountains, in the cannabis trade, when he met and fell in love with June. “Leave that on me, okay? I still know a couple of people. Let it go. We owe him one.”

“At least one,” Paige said.

Wes Lassiter awoke from his head injury in the hospital, cuffed to the bed, with no idea who had struck him. He claimed no memory of abducting his wife and was, of course, a victim, not a perpetrator, in his eyes.

But there were many witnesses—from Paige to the search party to the man who found him pointing a gun at the location where Paige was bound and held, Jim Post. A witness testimony that would, strangely, never be required. The assistant district attorney promised they wouldn’t accept any plea agreements—for numerous probation violations from possession, breaching an order of protection, kidnapping and attempted murder—but in the end he did. Twenty-five years without parole for kidnapping, the other felony charges to be sentenced later with possible parole on those—but he would be a very, very old man before it became even possible for parole. If he’d gone to trial, it was possible for him to get life without parole. Paige and the town of Virgin River were extremely grateful.

Often Paige would awaken in the night with a cry on her lips, shuddering, trembling, shivering in fear. John would pull her close and say, “I’m here, baby. I’m here. I’ll always be right here.”

She would calm. She was safe. “It’s really over,” she would whisper.

“And we have the rest of our lives,” he always whispered back.

Nineteen

Rick had taken an afternoon off from the bar after his high school graduation to go over to Eureka and visit Liz. He asked Jack and Preacher if they’d be around the bar till closing—he’d like to talk to them when he got back to town. It was almost nine by the time he walked in. “Thanks for hanging around, Jack,” he said. “Preacher still in the kitchen?”

“Yeah. How’s Liz doing?”

“She’s getting by. She’s back in her old high school—summer school to catch up—and she’s getting some counseling there.” He shrugged. “She has some real sad days, but she seems to be holding it together. Better than I thought she would.”

“Glad to hear that,” Jack said.

Rick got up on a stool. “I’m eighteen now,” he said. “Not quite legal, but how about we have a drink together. You, me and Preach. Can we do that?”

“We celebrating something?” Jack asked, getting down three glasses.

“Yeah. We are. I signed up.”

Jack’s hand froze in midair. He had to force himself to complete the move, bring down the glasses. He banged on the wall that separated the kitchen from the bar to bring Preacher.

“We could’ve talked,” Jack said.

“There wasn’t anything to talk about,” Rick answered.

“What the—” Preacher started, having come quickly from the kitchen with a pretty scattered look on his face.

“Rick signed up,” Jack said.

His face fell from startled to stricken. “Aw, Rick, what the hell!”

“We’re going to drink to it, if you can get under control,” Rick said.

“It isn’t gonna be easy for me to drink to that, man,” Preacher said.

Jack tipped a nice whiskey over three glasses. “Want to tell us what was going through your mind?”

“Sure. I have to do something hard,” he said. “I can’t wake up every morning hoping that maybe today I’ll be a little less sad. I need something tough. Something that will show me what I’ve got. Show me who I am again.” He focused clear eyes on Jack’s face, then Preacher’s. “Because I don’t know anymore.”

“Rick, we could have found you something hard that wasn’t quite as dangerous. This is a warring country. They’re fighting Marines. They don’t all come home.”

“Sometimes they don’t even make it out of their mother’s womb,” Rick said softly.

“Aw, Rick…” Preacher said, hanging his head. “It’s been a real hard year.”

“Yeah. I thought about a lot of things. School, bumming around the country for a year, logging, construction. I could beg Liz to marry me—but it turns out she’s still only fifteen.” He smiled lamely. “This is the only thing I can do, Jack. Preach. It’s kind of what I was raised to do, if you think about it.”

“So now it’s not bad enough you’re doing it, you’re going to blame it on us?” Jack said.

Rick grinned. “If I do okay, you’ll take all the credit.”

They were quiet for a moment, then Jack said. “You giving notice?”

“Not really, Jack. I’m going right away. I was hoping you’d take me to the bus in Garberville.”