скачать книгу бесплатно
Dan watched Jack’s eyes as he said this and he knew he wasn’t getting the whole truth. He didn’t blame the guy. It was going to take a while to prove he wasn’t a low-life criminal. He knew there’d be a price when he made the decision to enter the marijuana trade. Right now he could probably get assistance from someone still growing, but Dan didn’t want to go that route. He meant it when he said that was in the past.
“Okay,” Dan said, “I get that. And like I said, I’m not uncomfortable. I park at a rest stop at night. There’s hot water and facilities. What are your hours of operation? I’m looking for an occasional hot meal and a packed lunch to take on the job.”
“We can handle that for you. I’m usually here by six-thirty and Preacher lives on the property. He has the coffee on by six. We stay open till about nine at night, later if someone asks us to stay open. If you let Preacher know in advance, he can have a packed lunch ready for you in the early morning. If you need any—” The phone rang in the kitchen. “Give me a second. I’ll be right back.”
“Take your time,” Dan said.
While Jack was gone, Dan wondered, just curiously, if the till was locked. Would Jack Sheridan leave him alone in the bar with a money drawer open? Did he trust him a little bit, or not at all? He wouldn’t blame Jack if it took him some time to warm up to Dan—after all, this was the first hour of the first day they had a legitimate relationship. But Dan and Jack had history. Lots of history. And it wasn’t all so good.
The first time they’d crossed paths, Dan had to get the local midwife to help him with a birth gone bad at an illegal grow site. That midwife was Jack’s woman, and that whole episode went over like a turd in a punch bowl. The next time they came into contact, Dan had actually rear-ended that same midwife, and she was nine months pregnant. Again, not an auspicious beginning for their friendship.
But then he’d redeemed himself. Dan was in the area when some local men were searching for Preacher’s wife, who’d been abducted by her homicidal ex-husband. It hadn’t been Dan’s plan to save the day, but the rest of these louts couldn’t hack it and someone had to act. So Dan whopped the ex-husband on the head with his flashlight, knocked him cold and facilitated rescue.
Then there was the forest fire last summer. By the sheerest coincidence, Jack was sitting by the side of the road, hurt and dehydrated, as Dan was making his escape from a couple of lunatic growers. He picked Jack up and got him to safety.
Jack had apparently forgotten the good parts. Or decided they weren’t good enough.
Shortly after that fire, there had been a warrant for Dan’s arrest and that’s when he’d turned himself in. By virtue of being highly cooperative, he’d only served six months of a three-year sentence. But still, he was now and forever an ex-con.
His beer was long gone. Whoever was on the phone must be important or Jack Sheridan wouldn’t leave someone he didn’t trust alone in his bar. Hell, he wouldn’t even take his money if it smelled like—
His thought was cut off as Jack wandered back into the bar, his face white and his eyes unfocused. He clutched a piece of paper in his hand and he didn’t look at Dan. He didn’t go behind the bar, but stood just outside the kitchen door and stared blankly at nothing.
“Hey, man,” Dan said. “Hey, Sheridan.”
Jack didn’t respond. He was a million miles away.
Dan got up and approached him warily. He looked weird, and weird could sometimes mean unstable. Unstable could mean anything.
“Sheridan? What’s up, man?”
Jack’s unfocused eyes slowly pivoted toward Dan. He licked his dry lips, blinked a couple of times. “My boy, Rick,” he said in a hoarse whisper.
“What?” Dan asked a little frantically. He’d had a boy of his own once. He’d probably worn those same eyes at the time. “What about your boy Rick?”
“Rick,” he said, and lifted the piece of paper on which he’d scrawled notes. Haditha, Al Anbar, hostile, critical, grenade, Landstuhl Medical Center, Germany.
“Shit,” Dan said. “Hey! Snap out of it! What happened?” He gave Jack a couple of pats on the cheeks, carefully. He didn’t slap him; Jack might be reactive enough to coldcock him. “Whoa, buddy.” He grabbed a bottle off the glass shelf behind the bar and tipped a shot over a glass. “Hey,” he said, lifting the glass to Jack’s lips. “Come on, burn it down, buddy. Get a grip.”
Jack’s shaking hand came up to grab the glass. He closed his eyes, threw back the shot and kept his eyes closed for a long moment. When he opened them, they were burning with a feral gleam.
“Something happen to your son, Jack?” Dan asked.
He shook his head. “Rick is like a son. He’s in the Corps in Iraq.”
“Yeah, I got that,” Dan said, looking down at the paper. “Haditha, in Iraq. Landstuhl Medical. Been there.”
“He’s wounded. He might not make it.” He shook his head. “I gotta think straight,” he said to himself.
“Jesus,” Dan said. He shot into the kitchen. “Anybody back here? Hey! Anybody back here?”
In a second a woman came through a door into the kitchen. He recognized her. She was the woman who’d been abducted—Paige. The last time he’d seen her, she was pregnant. “What is it?” she asked, confused.
“Gimme a hand out here, huh?”
She followed him into the bar. Jack was leaning against the cupboard behind the bar and a little sanity had crept back into his eyes.
“Somebody named Rick is hurt in Iraq,” Dan said. “Can you find Jack’s wife? Call her or something?”
“I’m all right,” Jack said. But Paige bolted to the kitchen. “I just have to think. I was in his file as next of kin, probably because his grandmother is old and sick. Lance Corporal Sudder, they said. Took a grenade in Haditha. They got him out of surgery in Iraq and transported him to Germany, but he’s not in good shape. They had to resuscitate twice and there will be more surgery,” he said. “I have to think.”
“Whew, have another one. Slow down the brain a little,” Dan said, pouring a half a shot of something, he wasn’t even sure what.
He handed it to Jack, and Jack threw it back. He shut his eyes hard. A single tear escaped and ran down his cheek. He opened his eyes again and looked at Dan through slits. “Black Label,” he said hoarsely. “You act like you own the place.”
Dan laughed out loud. “There you are. You on my planet now? What happened?”
“Gimme some water. I’m getting there.”
Dan poured a water and Jack took a big drink. By the time he lowered the glass, Paige was standing in the kitchen doorway. Dan glanced at her.
“My husband has gone for some supplies,” she said almost apologetically. “The kids are napping. I called Mel at home and told her to come right now. It’s Saturday, the clinic isn’t open.”
“I’m okay now,” Jack said. “Rick was wounded in Haditha. He’s hurt real bad. Legs, head, torso, miscellaneous injuries. They airlifted him to Germany. I have to tell Lydie Sudder and Liz.” He looked at Dan. “Liz is his girlfriend. Then I have to go.”
“Go?” Dan asked.
“I’ll have to get to Germany. This is my fault. Kid never would’ve gone into the Corps if it hadn’t been for me and all my boys, here all the time, making him think it’s just one big goddamn party. Shit.” He swiveled his eyes to Dan’s. “They said he’s bad. He might not make it. That I should be prepared for that.”
“You got phone numbers on this paper, buddy. Once your brain is engaged again, call back and get some more numbers so you can check in at Landstuhl, find out how he’s doing. You had a big shock. You need to get stable.”
“I need a cup of coffee,” Jack said. “I had to think a second who Lance Corporal Sudder was. God, my worst nightmare.”
“Sit down on a stool,” Dan said. “I’ll fix you a cup of coffee.”
Jack looked at Paige. “Try to get Mel before she makes the drive. Tell her I’m just coming home in a little while.”
Without a word, Paige went back into the kitchen to use the phone.
Jack sat up at the bar, a place he was never seen. In his usual place behind the bar stood Dan, serving up coffee in a big mug. He didn’t ask any more questions and didn’t need to.
“Ricky turned up when he was thirteen and I’d just started working on the bar. It was a shithole then. I slept in the rubble while I tried to get it straight. He was small back then—his face was covered with freckles and he couldn’t shut his mouth for five minutes.” Jack laughed and shook his head, remembering. “I let him hang around because his mom and dad were dead and he just had his grandma. And the goofy kid sucked me in. He’s twenty now. No more freckles. Six-two. Strong…”
“Gotta remember he’s strong, Jack,” Dan said. “Don’t give up on him.”
“He shouldn’t have done it, joined the Marines, but he was first in every training program, he was good….”
“Is,” Dan corrected. “Get it together, man.”
“Is good,” Jack repeated. He took a deep drink of hot coffee. “I don’t know what I can tell Lydie and Liz….”
“You tell them he’s hurt bad, in the hospital, and you’re going there. That’s what you tell them. You don’t give anyone permission to give up. If the worst happens, then you’ll tell them the worst. You don’t tell them the worst before it happens.”
“You should’ve seen him, man,” Jack said, drinking more coffee, smiling. “I taught him to hold a hammer, fish, shoot. He was such a little nerd at first, all gangles and pimples and that damn giggling, I thought he might stay that way forever. But he grew up fast—turned out to be a little faster in the saddle than was good. Whew. I felt like a father to that kid—”
“Feel,” Dan corrected. “Feel like a father…”
“I do, that’s a fact.”
Paige popped her head back into the bar. “She’s already on her way, Jack.”
“Aw, we shouldn’t have bothered her.”
“She needs to be here,” Dan said. Paige withdrew again, leaving them alone. “She’ll go with you to see the grandmother, the girlfriend. Then you’ll go see Rick. You think you’re together enough to do that? To go to Germany? Because if you’re nuts or in some flashback, you can’t chance it. It wouldn’t be a good idea.”
Jack took a drink from his coffee cup, then slowly raised his eyes. “I won’t let him down. I think I was in shock for a minute.”
“Yeah,” Dan said.
Dan stood behind the bar while Jack sat as a customer. Dan refilled his coffee mug, then pulled another Heineken out of the cooler, but this time he drank it from the bottle. For a few minutes they talked quietly about Rick and what he meant to Jack. About the letter not so long ago that described how dangerous it had been in Haditha lately.
The sound of boots on the bar’s porch brought Jack off the stool and toward the door. He pulled it open and there stood Mel, her eyes wide and her mouth open slightly. “Ricky?” she asked in a breath.
“Wounded in Iraq. He’s had surgery to stabilize him, but I’m not even sure on what. He had leg, torso and head injuries and has been airlifted to Germany, to a military hospital there. Mel—”
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
“I’m coming around. It knocked the wind out of me. Where are the kids?”
“Mike came over from next door—they’re sleeping.”
“I have to tell Lydie and Liz.”
“First Lydie,” Mel said. “Then we’ll go home and while you pack, I’ll get on the computer and find you plane tickets. Then we’ll go to Eureka to see Liz. We’ll go in two cars, I’ll take the kids with me. When you head for the airport, I’ll bring the kids home. Unless you need me with you in Germany. Thing is, I don’t have the kids on my passport. Shit, how dumb was that, with Rick in Iraq! Why didn’t I take care of that? Well, maybe I should come. I can fly to L.A., get the passport handled in a day, and—”
“Mel, stop. You’re not dragging the kids to Germany,” Jack said. “Come on, let’s get going.” He held the door for her.
As she was leaving, she looked over her shoulder at the man behind the bar.
“I’ll—ah—leave a few bucks on the bar,” Dan said. “And help the lady in the kitchen till her husband gets back, if she needs me.”
“Don’t worry about the few bucks, unless you want to pitch in for that Black Label you threw down my throat,” Jack said with a weak smile.
“Thank you,” Mel said.
“Hey—” Dan shrugged “—glad I was here.”
Jack started to leave, but then he stopped again and looked at Dan. “The thing that did it, the thing that knocked me out for a while…When I told the sergeant who called that I’d get right over to Germany, he asked me if I didn’t want to wait until Rick was out of surgery, until they knew his condition, in case he didn’t make it. And I said no, I wasn’t waiting. I was either going to see him or bring him home. Just thinking that? It put me in shock.”
“Well, stop thinking it now,” Dan said. “Get going. Remember, he’s strong.”
“Yeah,” Jack said. “Yeah.”
“Jack. Remember, you’re strong, too.”
Lydie reacted exactly as Mel expected. She gasped, got teary and twisted her hands, asking questions for which Jack had no answers. But then she straightened her neck and stiffened her spine and began to pray. “I’ll be all right,” she said bravely. “When you get there, tell Ricky his grandma is fine and praying for him. He worries about me too much. I don’t want him to worry when he should be working on getting better.”
“I’ll come by and check on you later today,” Mel said. “Don’t get upset and forget to test your blood, take your insulin and eat. Promise me.”
“I promise. Now go. Don’t waste your time here. He needs you.”
Liz was another story. After booking a flight and packing a duffel, Mel and Jack drove to Eureka in separate vehicles. Liz met them at the door before they were halfway down the walk. “Is he alive?” she asked before they even told her why they were there. Her eyes were as big as hubcaps and frightened. “Is he alive?”
They couldn’t even get in the door. “He was wounded, Liz,” Jack said. “He’s seriously hurt, but he’s in the hospital. They airlifted him out of Iraq and he should be in Germany soon. I’m going to see him, and when I get there, I’ll call you immediately and tell you his condition. I’ll—”
“Take me,” she said, whirling around and fleeing back into the house. Over her shoulder she said, “I knew all day. I knew. I couldn’t get him off my mind and I was worried all day. I worry a lot, but not like lately. I have a passport and—”
“Liz! No!” Mel said. “Now stop, honey. Let Jack—”
“No, if Jack won’t let me go with him, I’ll go by myself. I’ve never been on a plane, but I’ll figure it out. I have to go, I have to be there for him, I have to—”
“Maybe she should,” Jack said quietly.
Mel tugged on his sleeve to bring his ear to her lips. “Jack, what if you get there and it’s the worst case? You shouldn’t have to deal with all this.”
“It’s not going to be worst case,” Jack said. “And if it helps Rick…Maybe it’ll help Rick.” He looked at Liz. “You have a computer?”
“Of course.”
“You pack. Mel will get you a ticket. You have to hurry. We have to drive to Redding.”
“I knew all day long,” she whispered. “I have almost a thousand dollars saved.”
“Where’s the computer?”
“In here. In my bedroom. Will it cost more than a thousand dollars? Because I could borrow some from my aunt Connie.”
Jack took the baby out of Mel’s arms, hanging on to both children, freeing her. “Put it on the card, Mel. Get her a ticket on my flight if you can.” Mel just looked up at him with a large question in her eyes. “It’s his girl. He loves her. And she knew all day. There’s a bond. He’d probably rather have her there than me. Besides, we have to get it straight, how you act around someone who’s been critically wounded. Liz is up to it.”
“Liz, will your mom be okay with this? You’ll miss a bunch of school.”
“I’ll call her. She’s got her cell phone. It doesn’t matter—I’ll make up school. This is Rick. I have to be there with him.”
“Liz,” Mel said. “What if it’s terrible? What if he’s not okay?”
She threw a soft suitcase on the bed and looked at Mel with clear, determined eyes. “Then I have to be there even more.”
Mel sighed and sat down at the computer.
