The Return Of Cord Navarro

by Vella Munn

  For several minutes she stared in the direction Cord had gone, then slumped forward slightly, ineffectively trying to wipe the mud off her pants leg.

  She understood that tracking required keen concentration, and that Cord was used to working alone. Undoubtedly he knew things he wasn’t telling her; he had to be thinking about other times when he’d done this, and the way those situations had turned out. Talk to me, Cord. Let me in!

  When Cord returned, he simply stood a few feet away, unmoving and impassive, saying nothing. But because she understood at least a little about him, she knew he’d found what he needed.

  Handling both horses, she followed after him as he led the way. They’d gone no more than a hundred yards when he stopped near a forked pine surrounded by saplings and pointed to the ground. At first she didn’t see anything. Then she made out indentations some six inches apart, one slightly ahead of the other. This was the message her son had left behind. Her knees felt weak; she fought to hold herself erect.

  “He’s walking white man style,” Cord explained, his voice devoid of judgment.

  “ ‘White man style.’ What does that mean?”

  “With his toes pointing out and his feet cutting a wide path. A white man plows through the land. He invades far more space than he needs to.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “For tracking him, good. An Indian takes a narrow path, one foot in front of the other. He walks with his thighs and that uses less energy. The way Matt is walking, he’ll tire faster.”

  “Then...maybe he won’t have gotten very far,” she said.

  “Far enough.”

  He was right, of course. “Do you have any idea how long ago he was here?”

  “Yesterday.”

  Yesterday was a lifetime ago. Not breathing, she wrapped her arms around her middle and took in her surroundings. Copper Mountain loomed over them, beckoning, standing in their way of returning to civilization. Her son was somewhere in that horrible vastness, and she wouldn’t leave this massive prison until she’d found him.

  “I want to touch him.” The words came out a whimper; she couldn’t help it. “I need to touch him.”

  “I know,” Cord whispered and stepped, surprisingly heavy-footed, toward her.

  “It’s the same for both of us,” she managed, because that was what she desperately needed to believe. “Only—” She inched closer to him, then stopped, feeling too raw for anything except honest words. “Cord? Please tell me something. This has to be difficult for you, doesn’t it? You must have all those memories of times when...when you couldn’t do enough.”

  “Yes.” He looked down at her. “It is.”

  She wanted to weep, to hold and comfort Cord. To absorb his emotions through her senses as she’d never been able to do when they were so young and untested by life.

  “Don’t think about that,” she said after a silence of her own making that went on for a long, long time. “It’ll only tie you in knots if you do. At least we now have a starting point. That’s what we have to concentrate on.”

  “I know.”

  She sucked in air and fought for control over something that threatened to swamp her like a giant wave. “From, uh, from what you can tell about the prints, how is he? I mean, does it look as if he has much energy?”

  Cord ducked his head and slipped under a tree branch. His body telegraphed nothing except the message that he knew where he was going—at least for this moment. “A lot of energy.”

  Chapter 7

  Chuck Markham shrugged and then shrugged again to reposition the rifle he carried slung across his shoulders. Finally he made himself face the three men who’d hired him. No one, himself included, had shaved in the past four days. Neither had any of them changed their clothes, and although he was accustomed to forgoing the so-called necessities for days, even weeks at a time if the conditions warranted it, his clients had done so much complaining that he wondered what the hell they thought this hunting trip was going to be, a resort vacation?

  The eldest of the trio, Elliott Lewis, was in the best shape, and that wasn’t saying much. Of course they’d all be doing a lot better if they hadn’t insisted on bringing half their worldly possessions with them.

  Hell, that wasn’t his problem. What was, was finding them something they could shoot and take back home to mount on a wall, not because he gave a damn about their macho pride but because satisfied customers sent more business his way.

  “Wait just a minute,” Elliott insisted when Chuck started walking again. “I’m not taking another miserable step until I know where we’re going.”

  “I told you.” Chuck didn’t care whether he kept irritation out of his voice or not. If worse came to worst, he’d already gotten half of his fee up front. “After that little stunt Owen pulled, we’ve got to get to higher elevation.”

  “Little stunt!” Owen snapped. “I was freezing, just like everyone else, you included. The fire I—”

  “The fire you set could have tipped off someone, like a forest ranger or cop, and you know it. And it’s so far from freezing that it isn’t funny.” Stepping closer to Owen, Chuck jutted his chin at the bank executive and stared until Owen dropped his gaze. “One more stunt like that, and I’m pulling the plug on this adventure of yours. You all said you understood the risks, and the necessity of caution. So far I’ve seen damn little of that. The way you plunge through the woods, it ain’t my fault you’ve scared everything away.”

  “The hell you’re backing out!” Elliott looked as if he was going to shake his fist, but wound up scratching under his chin.

  “We’re paying you plenty to—”

  “I know what you’re paying me, but all the money in the world isn’t going to get me anywhere if I’m in jail, is it?”

  No one had a response for that, which suited him just fine. It was his guess, based on more than fifteen years of experience as a hunting guide, that these white collar types had boasted to everyone they could get to listen that they’d come back with a trophy elk, mountain sheep, bear, or all three if possible. And given the circles these men moved in, no one was likely to blow the whistle on their illegal activities, just give them a hard time about being skunked.

  Skunked. They shouldn’t be, no way. The game was out there. He’d all but walked them into a black bear’s den a couple of days ago, but no, the fools hadn’t kept their mouths shut and the bear had bolted. Yesterday five, maybe six deer bad done the same. The only thing that could ruin this particularly lucrative expedition was their own stupidity—stupidity that placed a smoking camp fire at the top of the list. Well, he’d let Owen know in no uncertain terms that he’d leave him out in the middle of nowhere if he so much as thought about pulling another stunt like that.

  If it wasn’t for the money, he wouldn’t have anything to do with the men and occasional woman who believed that having the money to do whatever they wanted put them above the law. Not that he could think of any other way he’d rather make a living, not by a long shot. It beat being a mechanic all hollow.

  What he did for a living was a game. The biggest challenge out there and a lot safer than robbing banks, which he’d never wanted to do anyway. Him and his clients against the bumbling, ineffective cops and rangers who kept trying to put him out of business. What the law would never understand was that all it got out of this cat and mouse chase was years and years of work followed by a measly pension while he was already rich and getting richer.

  And all he had to do to keep the money rolling in was give his clients the hunt of their lives.

  “You’re sure?” her mother asked as Shannon knew she would. “You really don’t want anyone else up there? I mean, now that you know where he is—”

  “Mom, there’s nothing an army can do that Cord and I can’t. Besides, I don’t want to embarrass Matt.”

  “Neither do I. But if his tracks were from yesterday—darn it. I want to hold that boy so much I can hardly stand it.”

  Shannon felt th
e same way, maybe even more so. At least the grinding, painful knot in her stomach had eased now that they were on Matt’s trail. It would only be a matter of time, just a matter of time. She told her mother that, and her mother agreed. They both played the game so well.

  She and Cord had stopped to rest the horses again, and she’d prided herself on having the presence of mind to check on their condition before getting in touch with her folks. It both helped to hear her mother’s voice and made her ache with the need to hear another voice, this one younger, louder, enthusiastic about everything.

  Catching herself in mid-thought, she realized that her mother was saying something about how it had rained like crazy for about fifteen minutes shortly after they got there this morning but that the signs were getting more and more hopeful. “What about where you are?” Elizabeth asked. “Is it cold?”

  “No,” she said, Although she’d learned she had to keep moving to stay warm. Belatedly she remembered why her parents were at her place and asked how things were going. She was told that most of her customers had canceled their morning rides but so far those set to come in this afternoon still planned to. She apologized for taking her mother from her job with the Summit County tourism association and her dad from what was supposed to have been a day off work to go golfing.

  “Don’t you worry about us, honey,” her dad said, as she knew he would. “I wouldn’t have been able to golf in the rain anyway and helping your mom gives me an excuse not to show up at the office.”

  Finally, at her father’s request, she turned the walkie-talkie over to Cord.

  Although she tried to let them have as private a conversation as possible, she was aware that Cord’s responses were both brief and formal. Once, Cord and her father had called each other friends, but divorce had ended their relationship. She wondered if either man regretted what had been lost.

  For a moment, she felt a pang of guilt. It wasn’t her fault, was it? She couldn’t be expected to stay married to a man who locked himself away from her and her need to have someone to listen to her after their infant daughter died. Could she?

  As recently as two years ago she could have thrown back a decisive no in answer to her question. She was no longer so sure. Time had blunted the worst of that awful pain, and lately she’d allowed herself to try to see the past through Cord’s eyes, to ask herself what he’d been going through, and whether she’d failed him as much as the other way around.

  It didn’t matter. Nothing did, except—A distant rumbling caught her attention. Turning in the same direction as Cord, she scanned the gray sky until the sound was directly overhead. She couldn’t see the plane for the clouds, but she guessed it wasn’t very large, probably belonging to one of several local private pilots.

  “What do you suppose he’s doing?” she asked Cord as he put the walkie-talkie away. “If it was me, I’d wait until the visibility was better before going out on a sight-seeing flight. Darn, I wish we could reach him and tell him to keep his eye out for Matt. Do you think—”

  “I already talked to the sheriff. He said he’d contact the local pilots and the forest service.”

  She should have thought of that. Where had her brain gone? “I’m glad you did. If Dale hears something, he’ll contact you, won’t he?”

  “Yes. Of course.” Cord nodded and then muttered something she didn’t catch. She thought to ask him to repeat himself, then decided it didn’t matter. The only thing that kept her from dismissing the plane and its pilot, who probably couldn’t see the ground because of the storm, was the way Cord kept his head cocked toward the sound until it faded into nothing. She wondered if he would look at her, say something, but he didn’t. The sight of his broad back as he returned to work served as the only reminder she needed that leaving him had saved her sanity. At least, she hoped it had.

  Cord wondered if Shannon fully understood what he was doing when, occasionally, he stopped and retraced his steps before marking a rectangle left and right, front and back. He could have told her that he’d momentarily lost sight of Matt’s and Pawnee’s tracks and was picking them up again the way Gray Cloud had taught him. Other times when what he wanted eluded him, he went back to the last print and circled it slowly, concentrating. It didn’t matter which method he used as long as he kept picking up the trail. When he did that, Shannon remained where she was so her tracks wouldn’t confuse him.

  Had she learned that from him? He couldn’t remember telling her what her role during a search would have to be. He hadn’t often taken her into the wilderness with him, especially not after they’d gotten married and work and school and then a baby took up so much of her time.

  Maybe that was when they began losing each other.

  Maybe they’d only believed they had something in common because they were so young and in love, so overwhelmed by the exploration of each other’s bodies.

  He couldn’t believe that, not after seeing her standing raw and exposed in front of him when he showed her where their son had stood. Knowing how much of himself he’d handed her.

  The emotions wouldn’t be so strong if they weren’t in some way tapped into each other, would they?

  He wouldn’t allow himself to be distracted by further thoughts of what he and Shannon once had. His self-preservation depended on it.

  Suddenly he stopped, leaned over, then indicated the ground. “He rested here.”

  “How can you tell?” Shannon asked as she pressed closer.

  To him, the signs were as plain as any written message, but he pointed to the broad area of flattened grass that indicated Matt had sat here for a while. Beyond that were a number of heel marks, proof that Matt had scraped his feet over the ground while he rested. Good. There had been energy in his legs.

  Shannon squatted in front of the marks and ran her fingers gently over them. “If I touch where he’s been, can he tell? Does he know we’re here, that...that I love him?”

  She shouldn’t utter those words. When she did, her whispers dug at him and made it nearly impossible for him to concentrate on what he had to do. Still, insanely, he wanted to hold and comfort her, to erase the lost years.

  But he couldn’t. He didn’t know how, and knew better than to try.

  “If you believe he can sense you, then maybe he will. Shannon, if you need to cry—”

  “Cry? No, Cord. I’ve done all I’m ever going to do of that.”

  He tried to touch her because her rough words left him with no choice, but she jerked away. “You don’t understand, do you?” She all but threw the words at him. The tears she’d just denied sounded dangerously close to the surface. “The kind of vulnerability I felt when Summer was born and we knew she wasn’t going to live—I’m never going to cry alone again.”

  “Never cry? No one knows what life is going to bring, Shannon. What emotions will build up inside and need release.”

  She could have pointed out that her exact words were that she wasn’t going to cry alone, but she didn’t because he was right. Although she might wish with all her heart that life wouldn’t kick her in the gut again the way it had when Summer died and again when their marriage had ended, no one could look into the future. “What kinds of things build up inside you, Cord? Maybe I should know, but I don’t.”

  “Nothing anyone else doesn’t experience.”

  “I’m not so sure. I’d like to hear about it.” Instead of saying anything more, she simply continued to meet his gaze, challenging him to step away from what they’d begun with this conversation.

  He started slowly. “I’ve worked with so many people, seen them go through so much. Sometimes it turns out right, and sometimes it doesn’t.”

  “When it doesn’t, who do you talk to about it?”

  He didn’t answer her, but then, he didn’t have to. She knew he had no one. He’d had her for a brief while, and he had Matt; he needed more than that. She wished she’d allowed herself to acknowledge that before now, but there’d always been distance between them. “Cord, I was sca
red to death when I started my business. Sometimes I’m still scared. If I can tell you that, can’t you do the same?”

  His body rocked slightly, away from her and then closer again. She heard a rustling in a tree to her left and guessed that there were birds in there. As before, she waited.

  “Something happened to me last year,” he said. “Something that...”

  “Something that what?”

  “I was in northern Idaho teaching advanced life support to a group of paramedics when we got a call about a sports car that had run into a truck. There were kids in the car, two of them the daughters of the man who’d organized the class.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “I worked beside him for hours cutting those kids out, getting them stabilized and into helicopters to be air-lifted to the nearest trauma center. Doug couldn’t go with his daughters—I drove him the ninety miles.” Cord ran his fingers through his hair, grabbing still-damp chunks and holding on to them. “Doug told me about their births, his divorce from their mother, how he’d finally gotten custody of them. The whole time, we didn’t know whether the youngest one would live or whether his seventeen-year-old would keep her leg.”

  Shannon’s heart went out to him.

  “By the time we got there, both girls were out of danger. But they had to have surgery that night. It was just Doug and me until morning when his sister got there. The longest night of Doug’s life.”

  And one of the longest of yours, too, she suspected. “I’m glad you were there for him, that he wasn’t alone.”

  “So am I,” he said on the tail of a long, slow blink. “When it was over and we knew his daughters would come out of it in one piece, I left Doug with his sister, went outside, walked right past my car in the hospital parking lot, and kept on going.”

  She held her breath, every piece of her being focused on Cord. “You walked...” she prompted when he simply stood with his eyes now locked on the horizon. Don’t stop now, please! she begged.