The Ties That Bind

by Andi Marquette

  "It works both ways. I just need to know that we can talk about things." I waited then, sensing that Sage was going to tell me what had been on her mind earlier. She continued stroking my arm and her lips brushed my neck.

  "I thought maybe going 491, I could get a better sense of what happened out there," she said after a few minutes had passed. "I don't know why. Maybe because it feels closer to where he died and the reservation as a whole." Her fingers stopped moving on my arm and she sat up so she could look at my face. "I thought there might be answers out there. But I realized that I don't even know what the questions are."

  I stayed quiet, letting her continue.

  "And when that fucker bashed us from behind and we were going off the road, I thought about River and that I'd fucked up with him because I'd wanted to go 491 and then I thought about you and how upset you were going to be if this was it. And I thought how awful it was, and that all I really wanted was to see you again."

  I cleared my throat but the lump in it made it difficult. I fought the tears building in my eyes.

  She offered a half-smile. "And I knew you'd be thinking 'why the fuck did she go that way'?"

  I smiled back but kept my mouth shut.

  "And at the hospital, I was so sure you'd say something like that. But you didn't. I brought it up. You didn't. And that's when I knew how hard you've been working to change the way you do things, and how hard you've been working to be supportive while trying to keep yourself from flying off the tracks."

  A tear slid out of my eye before I had a chance to stop it. She wiped it off with her fingers.

  "I think I could have handled this better," she said. "I think I could've been more open with you about my feelings and things I was trying to figure out, and I realized that because of my past with my father, I don't know how to do that."

  My gut churned. What was she going to say? Was she done? Oh, no. Please, no...

  "Honey, it's okay," she said, soothing, recognizing my freak-out body language. "Did you just jump to the absolute worst-case scenario?"

  "Um," I started.

  "We'll talk about that later." She smiled. "And we'll talk about things that I should have told you already. What I realized is that I need to get some shit together. So I'm going to find a therapist when we get back to Albuquerque. I need to work through some of my baggage with Dad and with Mom, too. I don't want the habits I developed in the past to fuck things up in the future. Or at least I want to be able to deal better with things as they happen." She wiped another tear off my face.

  "Wow," I said. "Do you want me to go with you?"

  "No, not yet. I need to do this stuff alone first and then maybe if we feel we need to, we'll find someone to go to as a couple." She rolled her eyes. "But you know how I am. It'll take me a while to find someone I can work with," she said before putting her fingers on my lips. "But I'll keep looking until I do. Even if I have to drive to Santa Fe a few times a month, this is far too important. You're far too important." She kissed me and a pleasant jolt raced through my stomach down to my toes, suffusing me with the warmth of certainty and hope, and for the first time since River got Bill's letter, things were right with the world.

  "So how about a romantic dinner of Papa John's pizza with extra garlic dipping sauce?" I asked when Sage pulled away.

  "You sure know how to impress a girl," she teased.

  "Well, as I recall, you seduced me with a burger."

  She grinned. "Hmm. I did. It had green chile on it. Maybe it was the green chile." She moved away, freeing me. "Order the pizza," she said in a tone of voice that made me ache in deep parts of my body. "Extra green chile."

  I reached for the phonebook.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I FINISHED TRANSFERRING our duffle bags to the trunk of the silver Chevy Cobalt I'd just rented, declining any help from the young, strapping guy who looked like he lived to pump iron when he wasn't repping and shuttling for the car rental company. We only had two duffles, both of which probably weighed less than one of the dumbbells he no doubt used for preacher curls. My laptop I'd sent home with Kara.

  "Got a little butch thing going on?" Sage asked as Mr. Junior Universe drove away.

  I gave her an "I'm so sure!" look. "I didn't want him to have to wear himself out before the day's over. Poor thing."

  Sage giggled and got into the passenger seat of the car. I closed the trunk and slid into the driver's seat, where I put my seatbelt on and looked over at Sage. "You ready to blow this pop stand?"

  She leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. "Yes. Let's get the hell out of here."

  I grinned and guided us out of the lot toward Main Street. Once there, we turned left, headed toward New Mexico 550. "You know, I found out about a great body shop in Albuquerque if the insurance company thinks your car can be salvaged."

  "Oh?"

  "Yeah. Martinez, down on Gibson. I met his cousin a couple nights ago. From what he and his friends were driving, I'm thinking you could get an awesome lowrider out of this."

  "A lowrider Toyota. Not sure I've seen one of those," Sage said with a laugh. "Not sure I want to, either."

  "Just sayin'." I smiled at her and reached to turn on the radio just as her cell rang. I withdrew my hand before I pressed the button, waiting for her to take the call.

  "Hey, Tonya," she said. "What's up?"

  Oh, no. I gripped the steering wheel as a Very Bad Feeling stomped on my previous good mood.

  "What? Slow down." Sage glanced at me. "Honey, pull over," she ordered.

  Fuck. I slowed at the entrance to a strip mall and pulled into the parking lot, listening to Sage talk, hearing a building anxiety. The Very Bad Feeling was sitting on my shoulder, laughing. I knew it was. It was laughing at me and saying, very quietly in my ear,

  "Thought you were outta here, huh? Sucker!" My stomach sank.

  "Who?" Sage was asking Tonya, urgency making her grip my arm. "Are you sure? Lock the doors. Now. And call nine-one-one. No, don't do that. Lock the doors. Don't go outside. No, don't. Lock--" Sage released my arm. "Tonya?" She hung up and stared at me, a mixture of fear, anger, and resignation in her expression. "We have to go to Tonya's."

  "What?" I stared back at her. "No way. Call Simmons. Tell her there's something up at Tonya's, it's an emergency."

  Sage didn't say anything, instead just looked at me.

  "Goddammit," I fumed. "This isn't our battle. Let the professionals handle it." But even as I said it, I was already turning west, away from 550, and toward Shiprock.

  "She got a phone call late last night from a guy who said that if she didn't give him the notebook, he'd make sure she ended up like Bill, and he'd come for it today. She was getting ready to go to work and she opened her door and there's a guy in a pickup sitting at the end of her driveway."

  "Pickup?" I glanced over at her then back at the road. Maybe I did need to go to Tonya's. Because if the guy sitting in her driveway was the guy who messed with Sage and River, I was going to break his kneecaps.

  "Dark blue."

  And his elbows. Then I'd leave him tied to a stake near a lonely desert wash so skinwalkers could finish the job for me. I sped up. "Does she know who it is?" I gripped the steering wheel so hard my hands hurt.

  "She can't tell from her window. She was scared but pissed and said she was going to go out and tell him to fuck off."

  "Holy shit." Tonya might be ballsier than the guy in her driveway, sitting out there in broad freakin' daylight. In his dark blue pickup. Dark blue. Why did that keep digging at me?

  "I'm going to call Simmons now."

  I nodded, more to myself than Sage, and forced myself to drive the speed limit. What the hell was I racing for? What the hell could we do once we got there? The guy might have a gun. At the very least, he had a big truck and he wasn't afraid to use it. I glared out the window, imagining laser beams shooting out of my eyes.

  We reached the western edge of Farmington and I sped up, thinking I was crazy to go racing towar
d this situation, crazy for not trying to talk Sage out of it, and crazier still for wanting to race out to Tonya's and break some guy's legs. I am not behaving logically. Then again, had Logic's girlfriend been run off the road by a thug in a pickup, Logic might fly out the window, too, jump into her car, and go looking for whoever messed with her girlfriend.

  Sage hung up with Simmons and addressed me. "Tonya's about halfway between here and Shiprock. Turn left at the Hogback Trading Company. It's not far down that road, near the canal."

  "What'd Simmons say?"

  "She's on her way."

  I didn't add anything and instead mulled possibilities and courses of action, none of which involved pulling over or turning around. "So," I said after a while, "if this guy thinks Tonya's got Bill's notebook, why did he run you and River off the road?"

  "Because he thought River and I had it. When he didn't find it in my car, he decided to put some pressure on Tonya."

  "But why now? Why wouldn't they pressure Tonya sooner, like a couple of days after Bill's body was found?" I sped up to get around a truck hauling a flatbed trailer piled high with bales of hay.

  "Maybe because there wasn't a murder charge yet."

  That made sense. Why call attention to a death you're responsible for if nobody else is saying anything? "Good point. But they had to be watching her. Maybe the asshole who ran you off the road knew you and River were there yesterday and figured she gave you the notebook. Maybe that's why they went after you. Were you carrying anything when you got in the car?"

  "Shit," Sage said after a pause. "Yes. River was. That box of photos I told you about on the phone before you left. Tonya said they were photos that pre-dated her, so she figured we'd have more use for them. So somebody might have been watching us then," she added, echoing my thoughts.

  "Do you remember if you saw anything or anybody that didn't look right? Or if you maybe saw the pickup that ran you off the road when you headed out?" Holy hell, I sounded like Chris.

  "Let me think..." Sage stared out the windshield for a while, tapping her cell phone against her thigh. "No. I don't remember," she said, frustrated.

  We drove in silence for a few more minutes before she spoke again. "I have a copy of the notebook in my bag."

  I glanced at her, then back to the road, not sure where she was going with this information.

  "I can give it to the guy at Tonya's house. After all, he didn't say that he wanted the original. He might not even know there is one. For all he knows, Dad made several copies of it and mailed them out to news agencies all over the country."

  "And how do you propose we give it to him?" I asked, envisioning Sage marching up to the pickup and yanking the driver's side door open and saying something like, "Hey, asshole. Here's what you're looking for. My girlfriend is now going to break your kneecaps. You'd better call someone to drive you home."

  "I hadn't gotten that far," she admitted with a little grin that made me laugh, a mixture of insanity, stress, and the fact that once again, I was headed toward trouble instead of away from it. Sage stared at me for a second then she, too, laughed, and it felt good to share that with her in the midst of all this craziness.

  "Okay, honey, slow down. We're coming to the turn-off," Sage said, grabbing my arm. I did so, and as I turned off the road, her phone rang.

  "Hey, are you okay?" she answered.

  Must be Tonya, I thought, slowing down even more.

  "You did what?" Sage said into her phone.

  I glanced over at her, then back at the road. A car passed, going the opposite direction, and I turned onto the dirt road Sage had indicated before her phone rang.

  "Pull over," she said to me, and the urgency in her voice made me pound the brake, bringing the car to a stop in a cloud of dust.

  "What's going on?" I gripped the steering wheel, foot still on the brake, holding the car in position.

  Sage stared at me, eyes wide in disbelief. "You're not going to believe this."

  I waited, stomach knotted.

  "Tonya shot him." She hesitated. There was more. There had to be. I released my death grip so I could take her hand. "But he got away," she added.

  I groaned and leaned my forehead against the steering wheel.

  "ON THE PLUS side, he's got to get medical attention," Kara was saying over the phone as I stood in the driveway of Tonya's double-wide, uneasily watching the dirt thoroughfare that had brought us here. Maybe thirty yards separated her front door from the road that would take us back to the highway. Although if the guy came back, he might think twice, seeing two police cars parked out front.

  "If it's serious. It might not be. Tonya doesn't know for sure how much damage she did."

  "But she got his license plate, too. It's just a matter of time now, Kase."

  I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to stave off the beginnings of a headache, and still thinking about the dark blue pickup. The wind had kicked up and dust swirled around the driveway, coating my legs. "I'm so fucking tired," I said, half to myself, half to Kara.

  "Okay, tell you what. Take the car back to the rental agency and I'll drive up and get you."

  "Nah. By the time you got here, it'd be practically six and we'd end up staying the night. And if I spend one more night here, I'm going to go certifiably insane."

  "Okay...are you sure?" She sounded worried.

  "Yes. I'm so over this. How are you guys? Everything normal down there?"

  "Please. I'm a Fontero. How could things be 'normal'?"

  I smiled.

  "If you mean, is everything as it should be, yes. No weird phone calls, no threatening letters, no blue or black pickups cruising by the house. I'm thinking that Chris is right, and once you get out of there, the nutjobs are going to stay up there and self-destruct."

  "Let's hope." I turned toward the house. Somebody had added a covered porch to the front, along with a deck that went the length of the trailer. I wondered if Bill had done that. Sage was still talking to Simmons, who had brought Martin with her. He stood just behind her, arms crossed over his chest, sunglasses on. He looked like secret service. Sage nodded and said something then shook Simmons' hand. "Looks like things are wrapping up here and we'll be on the road in a few. Hey, have you heard anything about Purcell?"

  "Yes. Shoshana called a couple of hours ago and said he was still in Shiprock with relatives. I'll let her know what happened with Tonya so she can pass it along to him. I don't think it's necessary to call Nan."

  Something jogged a memory. Nan. Pickup. Dark blue. It clicked. Purcell's driveway. Dark blue Ford. "Don't." The word was out of my mouth before I had a chance to consider it.

  "Excuse me?"

  "Don't tell her just yet."

  "And your reasoning behind that?" she asked with a hint of petulance.

  "Just a feeling. It's not about her. It's about Purcell."

  "Oh, for fuck's sake. You've talked to him twice. What the hell is your issue?"

  "Something's not adding up." Chris always said that good instincts meant you'd been paying attention, whether you recognized it or not.

  "Like what?"

  "How many people live at Purcell's? Him and Nan, right? Nobody else?"

  "Why would I know that?" Kara sounded irritated.

  "Maybe Shoshana mentioned something about it. Think about it. It's just him and Nan there, maybe friends and relatives stopping by to visit. Right?"

  "I have no fucking idea where you're going with this."

  "If it's just him and Nan, and if Purcell doesn't drive--" "Not much. He does on occasion. So what?" "The truck, Kara. The fucking truck." Oh, my god. That's it. The link.

  "What?"

  "The first time we went to talk to him, there were three cars in the driveway, including a dark blue pickup."

  "Oh, hell no--"

  "Hear me out. The second time we talked to him, when I went over there to see what Monroe was up to, there were two vehicles missing, including that truck. Nan probably drove one, and I'd bet she d
rives the sedan, but who was driving the truck?" The thought jumped into my skull. Surano. He was driving it. Surano's the guy who ran Sage and River off the road.

  "You are fucking crazy," she said, dismissing me. "Purcell probably loaned it to someone who was moving or something."

  She had a point. I chewed my lip and stared again at the road.

  "And if he's in on any of this, why the hell is he in Shiprock with his wife's family? He received a threat, after all."

  "Did he? Or is that just what he told Shoshana?" I countered. After all, I thought, we can't prove the threat. It's what he told Shoshana. Because he knew it would get back to us. Oh. My. God. All we had to go on was what he told us. After all, we hadn't checked out any of his stories. We hadn't checked out his relationship with Monroe. Maybe they were buddies and Monroe was over at Purcell's warning him or telling him stuff about me and Kara and they got worked up trying to figure out what to do next. He's been playing us this whole time. I was almost positive that was the case. But why?

  "That's it. I don't want to hear any more of this bullshit. You've been weird about Shoshana since she came on to you."

  "Jesus, Kara. This isn't about her. It's about a guy that she's related to. It has nothing to do with her. If he's been feeding her crap, why would she think that it's crap? He's her uncle, after all. Why wouldn't she believe him?"

  "I don't want to talk about this. I'll see you when you get home."

  "Kara--" Too late. She had hung up. "Fuck," I said under my breath. I'd have to deal with her wrath later. Right now, I needed to follow up with Jamison Purcell and Jimmy Surano. I dialed Chris's personal cell but got bumped to voicemail, so I waited for the beep. "Hey, mujer, it's me. Listen, can you do me a favor and run a check on a Jimmy Surano? He might be listed as James and I think the last name is spelled S-U-R-A-N-O. He's employed at Ridge Star. I need to know if there's a connection to Jamison Purcell. Thanks. Oh, and Sage and I are about to head home. Catch you later." I left her with the assurance that we were, in fact, leaving Farmington before I hung up. I walked over to Tonya's front door, where she stood still talking to Sage and Simmons. Martin hovered behind Simmons, implacable.