Trail of Lightning (The Sixth World #1)(16)

Kai’s watching me, his eyes narrowed in thought.

“What?” I snap. I’m still jittery, amped from the monster hunt, the confrontation with Longarm, everything. My fingers curl around the steering wheel, and I force myself to loosen my grip. I’m jumpy and angry, but none of that is Kai’s fault. He hauled my ass out of the fire back there and I owe him for that. And he did it without anyone getting arrested or shot or stabbed. That’s no small thing, so the least I can do is rein in the attitude and try to make nice.

“That was something,” I say, and glance over. He’s staring at me. Expectant. Looking like he’s not going to make this easy. I try again.

“I guess it was a good thing that your father’s a cacique or whatever. That really helped us out. With Longarm.” There. A peace offering.

But he’s turned away from me already, looking out the window. Watching as the white mesa walls turn to red ones and sparse chamisa-filled landscape rushes by. “My father doesn’t know the Urioste cacique,” he says absently. “My father’s a college professor. Or at least he was before the Big Water.”

I frown, trying to remember what he said earlier to Longarm. “I thought you said he worked for the Familia Urioste.”

“He does. Digging ditches or whatever day labor they have him doing. Not much call for college profs these days.”

“He’s not Juan Cruz, friend of some famous somebody?”

“There is a Juan Cruz who works for the cacique, but he’s not my father. My last name’s Arviso.”

“Arviso? Then . . . were you lying?”

He looks over, smiles briefly. “Of course. That Law Dog didn’t want to hear the truth. He wanted a good story, so I gave him one. I mean, seriously. ‘The Law and Order of Dinétah’? Do you think anyone has ever said something that dumb? I made that up.”

I don’t know whether to be impressed at the size of his balls, or pissed at the risk he took.

“Juan does have a son, though,” Kai continues. “Nice guy. Alvaro Cruz. We’ve partied together, hit up those fancy Urioste galas in the mountains. Ate their caviar and drank their champagne.” He grins, momentarily lost in memory. Then he slaps my shoulder, the same one the monster chewed on. I flinch, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “It’s okay to say ‘Thank you,’?” he continues. “It was my pleasure to help out. I mean, that guy seemed like a real dick. I thought you could use a hand, before you stuck a knife in him, anyway.”

I grunt, and he laughs. It’s a nice laugh, clear and genuine, but I still can’t get over his lie.

“By the way,” he says as he pulls his aviators out of his shirt pocket and slips them on, “you got that whiskey in the back of your truck, right? You mind if we stop here in a minute? I could really use a drink.”





Chapter 8


A few miles past Fort Defiance, I slam on the brakes.

There, not ten feet in front of us, a coyote crosses the road. He pauses and turns his head toward us. Brown muzzle shot through with gray, long spindly legs. He stares at us, yellow eyes bright, before he trots on into the scrub and disappears down an arroyo.

“That’s not good,” I say.

“What’s not good?” Kai asks.

“Coyote crosses your path. It’s bad luck, for sure. Sometimes it means something worse.”

Kai nods thoughtfully, like he’s considering my words. Maybe he doesn’t believe me, city boy that he is. Thinks it’s superstition despite his medicine training. But then he says, “Should we turn around? Go back and find another way around?”

I glance out the window at the sun. It’s no joke, crossing a coyote. But I don’t see that we have much of a choice. “No. We’ll lose too much time if we turn around now. But . . .” I pull the truck over to the side of the road. Kill the engine. “Now’s as good a time as any to have that whiskey.”

Kai watches as I climb out and come around to the tailgate. I sling it down and hop in the bed. I find the whiskey jug packed between some old blankets and pull it free. Standing up in the back of the bed, I unscrew the cap and then raise the jug in salute. I hold the whiskey to my lips and take a swig. The amber liquor burns down my throat. I hold the jug out to Kai.

He’s gotten out of the truck and is standing with his forearms folded across the wall of the bed, eyes on me. The afternoon sun plays in the soft spikes of his hair, creating licks of blue flames around his face, making the silver stripes on his tie flash. He gives me a long stare, like he’s trying to figure out what I’m thinking, and then he reaches out to take the jug. He hefts it and takes a long slow swallow. And then another.

“You party a lot?” I ask.

He lowers the jug and cocks his head to the side, raises a hand to shield his face from the sun. “You’re not going to lecture me about the dangers of alcohol for Indians, are you? Tell me I’m some kind of outdated stereotype?”

“Just thought champagne was more your style.”

He blinks and gives a little chuckle. “You were listening to me?”

“Sure I was. Even if you were full of shit.”

He laughs as I hop off the truck and slam the tailgate closed. I come around and take the jug from him. “Never had the stuff myself. Not a big call for champagne on the rez. I was fifteen when the Big Water happened. I think I’d sneaked a sip of Coors by then. That’s the champagne of beers, so that’s got to count for something, right?” I grin at my own joke. Flip the gas tank open, fit in the sieve I’m holding, and pour the whiskey in. We watch as the bottle slowly empties and my gas tank fills.