Breakup (24 page)

Cheryl fired, Kay fired a return volley and a bullet hit the bar right in front of Kate with a businesslike thud. Another shattered a bottle in back of the bar and showered them all with glass and liquid. Kate sat down.

"Offhand," Dan said, picking brown glass out of his hair, "I'd say the answer to your question would be yes."

Dinah tasted the back of her hand. "I always did like a shot of Grand Marnier after a meal. Settles the stomach, promotes digestion, gives you that nice little glow, you know?"

Bobby slapped her hand away. "You're pregnant, you're not supposed to be drinking."

There was another shot and almost simultaneously anothe r bottle shattered on a shelf in back of the bar, raining tequila and shards of glass mostly on Bernie. A second later a withered finger dropped to the bottom shelf and rolled off into Bemie's lap. Dan and Amy both let out involuntary yelps.

Bernie's sense of outrage swelled to heroic proportions. "There goes the Middle Finger bottle! Goddammit! I just refilled it, too, and with Jose Cuervo Gold! This bullshit's starting to cost me money!"

He leapt to his feet and started around the bar. "All right, you two, that is just about enough!"

Cheryl swiveled and brought the rifle up. "Don't move, Koslowski! Don't take another goddam step!"

"Such language, Cheryl," Bernie said mildly, but he froze where he stood. One of the Grosdidier brothers said, "Oh hell," sounding more disgusted than alarmed. "I can't look!" Frank Scully screamed from beneath a table, and buried his head in his arms. While Shirley Inglima's attention was distracted Dandy Mike slid one hand beneath her blouse. She didn't object. As far as Dandy was concerned, Bernie ought to throw a shootout every day.

Kate rose to her feet to give Cheryl two people to cover. "Cheryl, this has to stop." There was a furtive noise from behind the bar and she knew Jim was crawling down to the opposite end. She raised her voice to cover the sound of his movements. "Put the rifle down, and maybe the Parks Service can get some kind of arbitrator in to resurvey the land and reroute that road."

Dan O'Brian might have had his own ideas about that but he kept quiet, for which Kate was profoundly thankful.

It didn't do any good. "You go to hell," Cheryl said tightly. "This has gone way beyond some arbitrator." The muscles in her shoulders tensed, the barrel of the rifle began to rise, and in that moment Old Sam Dementieff lunged forward to grab hold with both hands, gnarled knuckles gleaming against the dark metal.

Cheryl was around five foot ten, weighed in at 160 pounds an d was a hale and hearty forty years old. Sam was five foot one, weighed maybe 100 pounds with his boots on and had at least forty years on Cheryl, but he had a grip like the big claw on a king crab and he hung on like grim death as Cheryl tried to throw him off. The barrel swung first to the left and then to the right and then back again, this time all the way around in a circle so that it pulled Old Sam into a smart trot.

Kate and Bernie both took a step forward, but Old Sam's palms were sweaty and his grip slid down the barrel and off, right over the sight, which must have been fairly painful. Centrifugal force did the rest: Old Sam, moving by then at a medium gallop, slammed into Ralph Estes's back, which caused Ralph's gut to slam into the bar. Rudely awakened, Ralph sat up with a disbelieving snort, turned green and blew chunks across the bar, showering Dan and Amy with predigested popcorn and beer. It was as efficient an example of projectile vomiting as an admiring Kate had ever seen, but then she was out of the line of fire.

Cheryl, momentarily stunned, was motionless for one second too long, just long enough for the basketball fans to switch sports and sweep down in a group tackle. She fought hard, letting out a primal scream that Kay must have heard outside and correctly interpreted, because when Kate crashed through the front door and skidded to a halt in the middle of the parking lot, all she saw were the taillights of Wayne's old International bouncing down the road to Niniltna.

Kate swore in disgust and was turning to climb back up the steps to Bernie's front door when it burst open and Cheryl came flying out. She knocked Kate flat, left the footprint of a size-nine shoe on Kate's chest and made tracks for an ancient and filthy white Econoine van.

Kate sat up, only to be knocked flat for the second time that evening by the Grosdidier flying squad in hot pursuit. The door to the Econoline slammed, the engine started and the van fishtailed out of the parking lot and onto the road, moving at about the same pace as the now long-gone truck.

The Grosdidiers stamped and kicked and cursed, and only belatedly remembered Kate, still prone at the bottom of the Roadhouse's front porch trying to catch her breath. They stood around in a circle peering down at her, identical expressions of gathering concern on their nearly identical faces. "Are you okay, Kate?" Peter said, stretching out a hand.

Her breath returned with a great whoosh and she took in grateful gulps of cool night air. Ignoring Peter's hand, she got to her feet, wincing a little on the way up. "I hate breakup," she said, very quietly but with great feeling.

"She is hurt, guys," Luke said in an odd voice. "Look." He pointed.

Everyone looked, including Kate. Her right biceps was soaked in blood, and she became aware of a throbbing ache in the same area.

"Holy shit," Peter blurted, and the Four Musketeers exploded into action.

"Help her up the stairs!"

"Pressure, we've got to apply pressure directly to the wound!"

"Antiseptic, we need antiseptic!"

"Shock! She's going to get shocky!"

"We need to lay her down, put her feet up!"

Four pairs of hands reached for her.

"No!" Kate yelped. "I'm fine! Really! It's no problem. Don't touch that arm, Luke!"

Johnny said earnestly, "It's okay, Kate. We're just trying to help."

"I know," she said, still fending them off. "And I appreciate it. But please don't. I'm begging you. Please." The stairs rocked gently beneath her feet. Wet mud seeped through her shirt to her skin. Her left knee thought about giving. She strengthened it with a mental threat. "I'm fine, guys. Really. I'm fine." She turned and took the steps at a slow limp, followed at close range by a fourGrosdidier escort.

Inside, Bernie was surveying the shambles of his bar. He close d his eyes and shook his head. "Breakup," he said with loathing. Resentfully, he cracked the seal on a new bottle of Jose Cuervo Gold. The withered, slightly yellow middle finger floated down through the amber liquid to rest gently on the bottom.

Mutt left a handful of hair in Bobby's fist and bounded over to Kate, placing her paws on Kate's chest. Kate would have fallen right over if Paul, bringing up a close rear, hadn't slapped both hands on her shoulders. A rough tongue slurped the side of Kate's face, once, a second time, followed by an inquiring yip.

"I'm okay, girl," Kate said, not at all sure that was the case. "I'm all right. Settle down now."

Jim reholstered his pistol, which he had never fired. His eyes narrowed on Kate. "Is that blood?"

"I caught one in the arm," she muttered, sitting down heavily. "It just creased me. You got something I can tie it up with, Bernie?"

"Sure," Bernie said, long-suffering. "I got nothing better to do with my linen inventory." He produced a clean square of worn cotton sheeting, and the four Grosdidiers jumped forward as one.

"Hold it!" Kate barked. They halted, identical expressions of disappointment on their faces. Kate handed the cloth to Bobby and sat down so he could reach her.

Behind them furniture shifted as tables and chairs were righted. The back door opened and the quilting bee filed back inside in effortless dignity. Auntie Joy and Auntie Vi saw the blood on Kate's arm and hurried over to exclaim and offer Bobby advice. Bernie handed out broom and dustpan, and someone dropped change into the jukebox. The first song to play was, appropriately enough, Jimmy Buffett's "Boat Drinks," which made everyone laugh, a little shakily, and feel better.

"Doesn't look too bad," Bobby said, tearing the cloth into two strips.

"Bullet or glass?"

He scrutinized the wound. "If you made me pick, I'd choos e glass." He looked at her and smiled, without much more humor than Mutt showed baring her teeth. "Another battle scar for you, Shugak."

"Yeah," she said, closing her eyes for a moment, "now I can strip my sleeves and show my scars with the best of you."

"Whatever." He folded one of the strips into a pad and used the other to tie the pad to her arm, his hands deft and gentle. It smarted, and Kate winced. When he was done she said to Bernie, "You got some aspirin?"

He produced an economy-size bottle of Bayer. At her look, he said, "After the last two days, you don't think I need this much aspirin to run this place?" Kate took four and washed them down with warm Seven-Up.

"That's twice, Kate," Bobby said, his outward calm belied by the rage simmering beneath. "That's twice those bitches have taken their best shot at Dinah." They hadn't been shooting only at Dinah, but under the circumstances Kate respected his tunnel vision and didn't comment. "They've managed to clip you both times."

"Not to mention what they've done to my bar," Bernie growled.

"Not to mention," Bobby agreed. "Maybe it's time for a little executive action, you know?"

"Kate?" Jim said, studiously polite.

"Yes, Jim?"

He had replaced his hat, adjusting it so the brim formed a level line just above his eyes, which were steady and very, very cold. The bullet hole through the crown, above and just a little off center of the gold braid tie, lent a certain emphasis to his calm, precisely spaced words. "Would you drive me out to the Kreugers' and the Jeppsens' homesteads, please? I'm afraid I don't know exactly where they are."

"What are you going to do, once you're there?"

"Gee, I don't know," Jim said, descending momentarily into mild sarcasm. "Arrest them?"

"What for?"

"I'll think of something," he said, very dry.

Bobby's roar was back, with interest. "Yeah, attempted murder kind of leaps to mind!"

The wound on Kate's arm throbbed painfully. She looked past the trooper to see Mark Stewart standing very close to Jackie Webber. His chin was up, his shoulders back, the rangy, youthful body held gracefully erect. His clothes fit well, his face was clean-shaven, his smile swift and charming. He was a looker, and he knew it. He was accustomed to the adulation of the female of the species, and expected it.

His eyes met hers with easy, unworried self-possession.

He smiled.

Something inside her clicked into place.

Something else snapped in two.

It was the last straw. It was the final nail, it was too much on the plate, it was too many irons in the fire. It was jet engines falling out of the sky, it was bear charges, it was plane crashes, it was bodies revealed by melting snow, it was wives shooting at their husbands and too-heavy duties assumed too soon and it was murder most foul and it was overload, it was too much, it was breakup, that was all, the breakup of winter, the breakdown of marriage, of the social fabric, not to mention the very fabric of modern technology itself, and there was no shelter from the fallout.

Kate felt disoriented, frayed at the edges, and in self-defense she withdrew, took a step back, out of herself. It changed her perspective, as if she were perched on her own shoulder.

"At the very least, aggravated assault," Jim added. "With intent. So let's go."

Kate's second self whispered in her own ear. "I've got a better idea," she said.

Bobby was inspecting Dinah for wounds over her exasperated protests when the tone of Kate's voice got through to him. His head snapped around. "Kate?"

The second self whispered again. Kate got to her feet and smiled across the room at Mark Stewart. "Mr. Stewart? Would you like to come with me?"

She sounded like Mae inviting Cary to come up and see he r sometime, like Circe convincing Odysseus to stay an extra year on Aeaea, like Eve encouraging Adam to take just one bite.

Dan sighed.

Bernie shivered.

Jim Chopin, not a fanciful man, felt the hair rise on the back of his neck.

"Jesus, Kate," Bobby muttered.

"Down, boys," Dinah said, and wondered if Kate was aware of the power she had, when she bothered to use it.

Jackie Webber gave Kate a dirty look.

As the events of the past forty-eight hours-of the past year- had demonstrated, Mark Stewart was not a stupid man. Careful, methodical, a planner, he was a man who did nothing on impulse, a man with no nerves to speak of and no conscience to bother him after the fact. He had to know what Kate suspected, why the trooper had asked him to return to the mine, that they had learned at least some of the truth and guessed at the rest. But they had no proof, and as long as he continued to say as little as possible, they never would have. It would be foolish to go anywhere but back to Anchorage by the first available transport, and sheer madness to accompany this woman anywhere else.

But he was still a man who saw himself reflected in every woman he met, and the challenge in Kate's invitation made his hunting instincts sit up and howl.

As she had been certain they would. "I think you might enjoy it," she added, and smiled, a lush, lavish smile that promised him everything.

"Kate," Bobby repeated, this time a wealth of warning in the single word.

Her second self stopped her ears. "Stay," she said to Mutt, and sauntered to the door. She turned to look over her shoulder at Stewart, and smiled again. "You coming?"

No fool, Mark Stewart wasn't a coward, either.

And she was only a woman, after all.

He picked up her gauntlet and followed her into the night.

The road wasn't much more than a tractor trail, full of deep ruts, yawning potholes, treacherous glaciation and the occasional malevolent washout. It didn't help that it was now full dark before moonrise, but by that time Kate's second self had firm hold of the scruff of her neck and was whipping her unrelentingly onward. Lights flashed in the rearview mirror, showing one vehicle faint but pursuing. Branches scraped against metal. Tires cracked through thin layers of ice to splash into puddles beneath. The cab of the truck rocked back and forth.