The Widower's Two-Step (Tres Navarre #2)(63)

"For a while there," Miranda said, "Dad had to lock up the guns because Brent was threatening to kill himself. That's what Sheckly was talking about. Even now, I think about Brent with Allison—the way she might let him down—"

Miranda stared at the lantern across the field. "You know that expression—somebody's life is like a country song? That's us. Mother dying, then Brent and Maria—"

"And you?" I asked.

"It's coming." She said it with absolute certainty. "Mine is coming."

A bug zapper is not normally the kind of illumination that helps me decide a woman is beautiful. But when Miranda looked at me I decided exactly that. I'm not talking about cute—the vulnerable little kitten quality I'd imagined in her when she'd been onstage at the Cactus Cafe. There was a kind of quiet stubbornness in her face now that suited her well, a much older, steadier light than I'd seen before.

"Do you—" I stopped. I wanted to ask if Miranda lived here, in the tidy burgundy and blue room I'd seen. I hoped she'd say no, that the room was just a museum to her childhood. I couldn't figure out how to phrase the question and not sound judgmental.

As it turned out I didn't have to. Miranda heard what I was thinking.

"Yes," she said. "I'm afraid I do. Brent—he didn't have much choice about staying here. Me, I guess it's just a matter of laziness."

There were other possibilities, but it would've been meanness to challenge her.

Instead I said, "Why wasn't it a choice for Brent?"

"No medical insurance. Maria's medical bills were skyhigh. If Brent tried to get work, she would've stopped qualifying for government health benefits. They were forced to stay unemployed. That little shack over there is about all they had, and that only because Daddy insisted. Maria accepted for them. Brent would've been on the street first. He's too proud."

I tried to associate the word pride with Brent. It took some effort.

From inside the kitchen Willis Daniels' voice laughed long and hard. He was saying good night to what must've been his last departing guest.

"What did you ask me out here for?" I said again.

Miranda stared at her hands. "Inside—in my room— you didn't understand."

"I guess not. I thought you were asking me to get Allison out of here."

The lights of the last truck headed down Serra Road. As soon as they turned onto RR22, the kitchen erupted with shattering crashing sounds—like somebody sweeping a cane across a counter full of glasses. Willis Daniels yelled four or five obscenities.

Then it got quiet again.

"No," Miranda said, not in response to the noise but like she was merely carrying on our conversation. "I wanted you to take me out of here. I don't give a damn where to."

31

I pushed the VW a little too fast, rounding the ISPV curves on RR22 at fifty miles an hour. The wind blew around the convertible, coming at us from behind. It undid Miranda's hair from the scarf she'd tied over her head and swept strands of black for

ward so it looked like they were in a desperate race to beat the rest of her face out of Bulverde. She made no attempt to push her hair back.

A hundred yards behind us, a car with cockeyed headlights was following leisurely.

"You know how to get to Les' office?" Miranda asked the question so softly that I almost didn't hear her in the wind.

"Sure."

We'd decided I was taking her to the agency's Victorian house in Monte Vista to spend the night. Miranda knew where the emergency key was. She said Les kept a guest room upstairs for touring artists and she didn't think he would mind her staying there.

I was pretty sure she was right about Les not minding. After a while she reached over and squeezed my forearm. Her hand felt incredibly hot in the cool of the wind. "Thank you. You okay?" "Sure. My jaw hurts a little."

Miranda let go of my arm. "I'm glad you took that punch."

"Because?"

"For a while there I thought you were Superman, what with smashing people into kegs and bringing croissants and guns to women in need."

I shook my head. "I got red underwear, though. Want to see?"

She smiled. "Maybe later."

We rounded another curve. The headlights cut a swath across the woods. Light brown ghosts moved behind the cedar trees—deer, foxes, possums. The headlights behind us disappeared, then reappeared, still about a hundred yards back.

When we turned south onto I10 the cockeyed headlights turned with us. Ahead, the clouds glowed above San Antonio.

We were still a few miles inside the Avalon County line when the lights behind us started edging closer. "About time," I said. "What?" Miranda asked.

I slowed down to forty and the headlights started to gain, then dropped back for a while. I slowed down some more.

Finally they gave it up. A red light blinked into existence on the top of the car and the handsiren started. It was a black Ford Festiva.

"What—" Miranda started to say. "Probably nothing," I lied.

"How many beers did you have?" she asked nervously. We pulled over.

I looked in my rearview mirror. The guy coming up on the passenger's side looked like a badly shaved orangutan. He had pale skin, brutish features, and a little tuft of orange on the top of his head. One hand held up a flashlight next to his ear and the other hand was under his wrinkled brown blazer.