The Law of Moses (The Law of Moses, #1)(58)

I met Moses’s eyes then, the golden-green orbs that were all wrong, and still so wonderful, in his dark face. And much like it had a week ago on that crowded elevator, the earth beneath my feet shifted, just slightly, just enough to make me wonder if the ground was slanted or my perspective was just skewed. I probably stared too long, but he stared right back, tipping his head to the side, as if he too needed to readjust.

The man beside Moses cleared his throat uncomfortably and then laughed a little, saying something under his breath that I didn’t catch.

“What’s going on at Kathleen’s? You sellin’ the place?” I asked, ending the stand-off with Moses and turning away. Cuss still had my other rope looped around his neck, so I snagged another one from the fence post on the other side of Tag. Cuss was hugging the far side of the corral like he’d been sent to time-out.

“Maybe. Right now, we’re just cleaning it up,” Moses replied quietly.

“Why?” I challenged. “Why now?” I eyed him again without smiling, not willing to make small talk with a huge mistake. And that was what he was. A huge mistake. I wanted to know why he was here. And I wanted to know when he would be leaving. I circled toward Cuss, making him whinny and tremble, wanting to run, but apparently not wanting to run toward the strangers at the fence.

“It was time,” Moses said simply, as if time held more sway than I ever did.

“I’d be interested in buying it, if you decide to sell.” It would make sense. I’d thought about it for a long time, but I’d never wanted to track Moses down to make an offer. But he was back. And if he was selling, the house made sense for me, bordering my parents’ property the way it did.

He didn’t respond, and I shrugged like it didn’t make any difference to me what he did with the house. I started moving toward Cuss, leaving the two unwelcome visitors to do what they wanted.

“Georgia?” I flinched when Moses said my name, and then Tag swore, a long, drawn-out shhhhiiiiiiit, that didn’t make a whole lot of sense.

“Georgia? Does that horse belong to you?” Moses asked sharply.

“Who, Cuss? No. I’m just breaking him.” I didn’t look up at the question, but continued moving in on Cuss.

“No. Not that horse.” Moses’s voice sounded strange and I looked up, beyond the round corral and the small riding arena, out to the pasture where our horses grazed.

They were a ways off, a half a dozen horses or so, including Sackett and Lucky, who we used exclusively for equine therapy and nothing more. Lucky had turned out to be the sweetest, mildest old boy in the world. Completely house-broken, that one.

“The Paint. Is the Paint yours?” Tag asked, and his voice was equally strained.

“Calico? Yeah. She’s ours.” I nodded, finding the pretty horse with her white mane and bright colors and feeling the familiar lurch in my heart I always felt when I saw her.

Suddenly Moses was striding away from the corral, covering the ground between the back of his house and our property without a backwards glance or a “see you later.”

Tag and I watched him go, and I turned baffled eyes on Moses’s friend.

“I would ask you what the hell his problem is, but I stopped caring a long time ago.” I reached Cuss and snagged the rope around his neck a little more firmly than I would have in other circumstances. He reared up and tossed his head, making me regret my hasty actions. I managed to free my rope from around his neck, but not without a little quick-footed hopping to avoid teeth and hooves.

“For his sake, I hope that’s not true,” Tag answered frankly, which baffled me even more. But he pushed off the fence as if to follow Moses. “It was nice to meet you, Georgia. You’re nothing like I expected. And I’m glad.”

I had no response but to watch him leave. He was twenty feet away when he called over his shoulder, “He’s going to be tough to break. I’m not sure ol’ Cuss wants to be ridden.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s what they all say, until I’m ridin’ ‘em,” I tossed back.

I heard him laughing as I started over with Cuss.





Moses



YOU WOULD THINK with a lifetime of seeing the dead, I would hate cemeteries. But I didn’t. I liked them. They were quiet. They were peaceful. And the dead were tucked away in neat little rows beneath the soil. Tidy. Taken care of. At least their bodies were. The dead didn’t roam cemeteries. That’s not where their lives were. But they were drawn by their loved ones’ grief. By their loved ones’ misery. I’d seen the walking dead, trailing behind a wife or a daughter, a son or a father, many times before. But today, in the cemetery in Levan, there were no walking dead.

Today, I saw only one other person, and for a moment, my heart lurched as my eyes fell on her fair head and her slim figure crouched by a nearby grave. Then I realized it wasn’t Georgia. It couldn’t be Georgia. I’d seen the horse and heard Georgia say Calico, and I came straight here. Plus, the woman was a little smaller than Georgia, maybe a little older, and her blonde hair fell down in curls from a messy knot on her head. She left a little bouquet by a stone that said Janelle Pruitt Jensen in large letters and moved off toward a tall man waiting at the edge of the cemetery. When the woman reached him, he leaned down and kissed her, as if consoling her, which made me look away immediately. I hadn’t meant to stare. But they were a striking couple—darkness and light, softness and strength. I could paint them, easily.