Once in a Blue Moon

by Sharon Sala

  “This is not good news,” Lon said. He took off his hat and combed his fingers through his hair. “Call in the two officers who are on patrol, and then call everyone who’s off duty and tell them to come to the PD. We need to figure out how we’re going to deal with this.”

  “Yes, sir,” Avery said, and reached for the phone while Lon went back to his office.

  * * *

  Cathy wanted to get out of the house for a bit. She didn’t really want to go for a drive, because she’d already done that, but she had a nice little gazebo out in the backyard that she’d never used, and she thought about checking it out.

  So she put on a lightweight jacket before going outside, and once she got beneath the roof of the gazebo, she could tell by the looks of it that it had been here for years.

  The floor of it was littered with dry leaves and a healthy layer of dust. The seating within it looked rough. It needed more than a dust cloth to get back in shape, but with some repairs to the inner circle of benches built into it, it would be an awesome place to sit. All in all, it looked sound, just in need of a cleanup and some paint.

  Now that she had a project to consider, Cathy wanted to begin so she went back into the house to get a garbage bag and a broom. She was coming back out of the house with her hands full when she thought she heard someone scream.

  She stopped—listening.

  Then she heard it again—and this time the sounds of more than one person screaming—and froze. That wasn’t the sound of children playing, and it wasn’t a scream of anger between two people. That was terror, and they were screaming for help.

  Her first instinct was to run to their aid, but with no way of knowing what she’d be running into, she went back into the house for her handgun, checked to make sure it was loaded, then put it into the inner pocket of her jacket and took off out of the house.

  The screams were coming from behind her house, and without a fence around the yard, she darted straight up an alley and kept running. Now she could hear more people screaming and shouting, and they all sounded like women and children.

  Her mind was racing, trying to imagine what could possibly be happening, as she came out of that alley, then darted across the street into the next alley, and then the next and then the next, until she came out facing the park.

  That’s why she was hearing so many voices. Something was happening at the park. Something bad. She thought she could hear sirens now, but they were a distance away.

  Cathy dashed across the street and into the park, and within seconds saw a half-dozen women running toward her. Some were carrying children, and others were holding their children’s hands as they ran. She still couldn’t see what they were running from, but the terror on their faces was enough to know whatever it was, it was bad.

  As she began running toward them, one of the women began waving her away, screaming something she didn’t at first understand. But when Cathy got close enough, she realized what the woman was saying.

  “Mad dog! Mad dog! Run!”

  Cathy’s pulse kicked. Could this possibly be the coyote Duke and the rangers were searching for? She paused as the women and children ran past her, and then when she saw nothing, she kept running.

  A coyote appeared less than thirty yards away, staggering and trembling, with foam dripping from its mouth. Cathy had a moment of déjà vu, then pulled her gun and fired.

  The coyote dropped.

  Cathy moved a few steps closer to make sure it was down, the gun still in her hands. Only she needn’t have worried. The time she’d spent at the shooting ranges in Vegas had kept her skill as a marksman honed. She’d put a bullet in its head.

  She had left the house without her phone, so she had no way of calling for help, but as it turned out, that didn’t matter. The sirens were louder now.

  She moved back from the dead animal and was putting the gun back on safety just as the first police cars arrived on the scene.

  Two officers bailed out of the cars and came running across the park with their guns drawn. And then they saw the animal lying dead and the new little redhead in town standing nearby holding a gun.

  Deputy Ralph was the first to reach her.

  “Ma’am, are you all right?” he asked.

  Cathy nodded. “I was outside. I heard screaming. Lots of screaming.” Then she handed him the gun. “I have a permit. It’s at my house.”

  “Thank you,” he said as she handed it over. “Just bring the permit down to the station, and we can release it back to you.”

  “Yes, I understand.”

  At that point, another three police cars arrived, and the chief was in one of them. The women and the children met him at the curb, all talking at once and pointing. He looked off across the park and realized the woman they were talking about who’d saved them was Cathy.

  He knew from hearing Mercy and Hope talking that Duke was sweet on her, and he knew Duke was in that search party. He needed to let Ranger Polson know the animal had been taken down, and he needed to let Duke know Cathy had been the one to do it.

  But duty called, so he notified Polson first.

  * * *

  Will was focused on the underbrush through which they were walking when his phone vibrated.

  “This is Will Polson.”

  “This is Chief Pittman. Your coyote is down. The carcass is in our city park. How far away are you now?”

  “Oh, good news!” Will said. “Hang on a minute. Let me call off the search.”

  Will pulled his walkie-talkie. “Stand down. Search is over. Our target is down. Call in the dogs and reconnoiter here with me.”

  The news spread, and a cheer went up. Duke heard the news and sighed with relief. He was tired, and Jack looked exhausted. He thought about the long trek they had to get home, and then headed toward the other end of the line where Ranger Polson was waiting.

  Polson got back on the phone. “Thanks. I just needed to call in the dogs and their trackers. So as you were saying…you located it in the park.”

  “We didn’t. A local woman heard screams, got her handgun, and went to see what was happening. The coyote interrupted a children’s birthday party. They were running away from it when she appeared on the scene and killed it.”

  “We’ll need to recover the carcass and dispose of it properly,” Will said.

  “Yes, sir. I have a couple of men guarding it now. If you’re not far from town, just keep walking. You should come out somewhere in the trailer park. Get to the entrance, and we’ll have rides waiting to take you back to your vehicles.”

  “Thank you, Chief. That would be much appreciated,” Will said. “See you soon.”

  He disconnected, then sat down on a dead tree and breathed a sigh of relief, waiting for the others to join him.

  * * *

  Duke and Jack were talking as they went.

  “I’m glad that’s over, and I think it’s closer to walk into Blessings and hitch a ride home with Hope than it is to walk back home,” Jack said.

  “Agreed. Give her a call and tell her not to leave town without us,” Duke said.

  Jack was calling Hope when Duke’s phone began to ring. He saw caller ID and smiled as he answered.

  “Hey, Lon.”

  “Hey. I know you’re in the search party, so you’re going to find this out anyway, but I thought you might like to know that your little redhead is the one who killed the coyote.”

  Duke almost stumbled. “What? What the hell are you talking about? Is she okay?”

  “She’s fine. Not sure how she got to the scene of the incident so fast, but there was a birthday party in progress at the park. Some mothers and a bunch of little girls had gathered there after school was out, and just as they were about to blow out the candles and cut the cake, the coyote came out of the bushes down by the creek. They realized it was rabid and started grabbin
g kids and running. One of the women told me they were screaming for help as they ran, and had been for a couple of minutes, when all of a sudden this woman appeared in the park running toward them. They said they tried to wave her away, warning her they were running from a mad dog, but she ran right past them, and when they turned around to look, they saw her shoot. She took it down with a handgun…in one shot. I don’t know where she came from, but she’s got country girl written all over her.”

  “I can’t believe this just happened,” Duke said. “I told her earlier about what I’d seen on the trail-cam footage, and that we were going after it. Although she’s never been to the farm, she offered to help us hunt it down. I told her no way was I taking her anywhere that would put her in danger. Now what are the odds that we would wind up flushing it straight down to her? Or that she would be the one to hear the women and children’s cries for help?”

  “Well, she did. And she’s still here at the park. Where are you?” Lon asked.

  “Probably ten minutes or so from the trailer park. Maybe a little more. There’s a whole bunch of us who are going to have a long walk back to the farm.”

  “I told Polson to get his men and dogs to the park. We’ll get all of you back to your farm.”

  “Hope is going to pick us up,” Duke said. “But there are a bunch of my neighbors needing rides as well.”

  “Duly noted. I already told them to wait at the entrance to the park. I’ll have rides waiting. Might be some volunteers, but we’ll make it work,” Lon said.

  * * *

  Once the officers were through talking to Cathy, she started to go back home. But the mothers were still at the curb, waiting for the children’s parents to come pick them up. When they saw Cathy coming back their way, they ran to meet her, exclaiming over her bravery and thanking her over and over for saving them.

  One mother was in tears. “I’m Phyllis Mays. My daughter, Carrie, is the one who was having the birthday. I was so scared our babies were going to be hurt. Oh my God, I will have nightmares about this forever. I don’t even know your name, but I will never forget your bravery. Thank you, thank you so much,” she said, and threw her arms around Cathy’s neck and hugged her.

  “I’m Cathy Terry…kind of a newcomer to Blessings. It was just a fluke I happened to be outside, or I would never have heard the screams.”

  “Where do you live?” Phyllis asked.

  “A couple of blocks off Main.”

  Phyllis gasped. “But that’s at least five blocks from here. How did you get here so fast?”

  Cathy shrugged. “I run a lot. Most mornings I run at least three or four miles.”

  “Well, that’s just amazing,” Phyllis said. “Oh, there are some more mothers coming to pick up their girls. I have to go.”

  Cathy watched her leave, and then realized as she was approaching the curb that one of those women was her landlord’s wife, Alice. She saw Alice scoop up a little girl into her arms. They talked for a couple of moments, and then the little girl pointed at Cathy.

  Cathy waved.

  The look on Alice’s face was pure shock, and then she put her daughter down and waited for Cathy to approach.

  “Hi,” Cathy said.

  Alice had tears in her eyes. “Sweet lord, Cathy, you saved my baby’s life. We almost lost her last year when she fell off a cliff during a school trip, and when I got the call about this incident, I couldn’t believe it was happening again. This is my daughter, Patty. Patty, this kind woman who saved your life is my friend Cathy Terry.”

  Cathy knelt, and then held out her hand. “I am very pleased to meet you, Patty. Your sweet mama came to check on me when I hurt my ankle.”

  “Thank you for saving us,” Patty said, and instead of shaking Cathy’s hand, she kissed her cheek.

  “I was just in the right place at the right time,” Cathy said to Alice. “All’s well. Go home and take care of your baby.”

  Alice hugged her again. “I am your friend for life. Just know that.”

  At that point, Cathy slipped across the street and disappeared up the alley. She kept thinking about that urge she’d had to get out of the house, even after she’d spent the better part of the day shopping. She should have been resting with her foot up, but she’d had an urge to be outside, and now she knew why.

  When she was little, her mama used to tell her how sometimes God used real people to perform miracles for Him. Now she understood what that meant. It was no coincidence that she felt the need to be outside. That was God getting her in the right place at the right time to help.

  She took a deep breath, and when she exhaled, it felt as if she’d let go of more than the incident from today. Maybe the last demons from her past were gone, too. She’d never been able to stop the devil she’d lived with, but she’d stopped that coyote, and put an end to the devil it had turned into from the disease.

  And so she kept walking, crossing streets into the next alley, and then the next, until she was walking into her backyard, right past that gazebo and all the way to where she’d dropped the broom and the garbage bag. She picked them up and went inside. Today was not the day to clean the gazebo after all.

  * * *

  Hope swung by the trailer park to pick up her boys. That’s how she thought of them. Her husband and his brother. She’d taken the both of them on the day she said “I do” and hadn’t regretted one moment of it since. She watched them walking toward her and smiled. Duke was at least two inches taller and his hair was darker, but it was easy to see they were brothers.

  They looked as tired as she felt, but with good reason. It was thirty minutes by car from the farm to Blessings, and the search team had walked the whole way down tracking that coyote.

  Chapter 11

  “There’s my girl,” Jack said as Hope pulled into the park. “I am so ready to sit down,” he added, and headed toward her with Duke beside him.

  But as soon as Jack reached the car and opened the passenger side door, he saw the exhaustion on Hope’s face.

  “Oh, Hope, honey…you look exhausted. I’m driving home.”

  “I won’t argue,” she said. “It was a hectic shift in the ER.”

  She got out and gladly took the front passenger seat as Jack held the door. Working and pregnancy were really pulling her down.

  Duke got in the back seat, then tapped his brother on the shoulder.

  “Would you please drive me by Cathy’s house before we leave? I want to check on her.”

  “Sure,” Jack said, and headed toward Cherry Street, while Hope reclined the passenger seat and closed her eyes.

  It only took a few minutes to get to Cathy’s house, and when Jack pulled up in the drive and parked, Duke got out.

  “I won’t be long.”

  “Take your time,” Hope said. “I’m off my feet, and that’s all that matters.”

  “Same here,” Jack said.

  Duke’s heart was pounding as he headed for the house. He’d never been scared for a woman’s life before. At least not that he could remember. It was a feeling he didn’t know how to process. All he knew was that seeing her made him happy, and when he left her, she was all he thought about. If that was love, he was so deep in it he was drowning.

  And then he reached the door and knocked.

  * * *

  Cathy was washing up at the kitchen sink when she heard a knock at the door. She grabbed a towel to dry her hands and went to answer it, expecting it to be more fallout from the coyote incident. But the moment she opened the door, Duke stepped over the threshold, wrapped his arms around her, and just held her.

  Cathy sighed. It appeared that he knew what had happened, and who was she to turn down a hug like this?

  All the worry Duke had been feeling settled the moment she was in his arms. He went from the hug to a kiss, and when her arms slid around his neck and she leaned into the
kiss, he groaned and finally pulled back.

  “This isn’t a stopping point,” he said. “Consider this moment on pause.”

  Cathy’s lips were tingling from the passion of the kiss, and her heart was pounding. Someday soon they were going to make love. They had to, or she was going to die from the want of it.

  Duke cupped her face, then brushed one last kiss across her lips.

  “Hope and Jack are in the car waiting for me, but I couldn’t leave town without seeing you. I needed to make sure you were okay and to remind you about our lunch tomorrow.”

  “I’m not about to forget anything to do with you,” she said softly.

  Duke sighed, then leaned down until their foreheads were touching. “You are something special, girl. See you tomorrow around eleven thirty. I’ll come by and pick you up, okay?”

  “Yes, very okay,” Cathy said.

  Duke ran the tip of his finger down the curve of her cheek, then traced the shape of her lower lip with his thumb, and all Cathy could do was stand motionless beneath his touch.

  “You make me crazy,” he whispered, and then he was gone.

  Cathy stood in the doorway and waved as the Talbots drove off, and then the moment she closed the door, she did a little two-step and danced her way back to the kitchen.

  “Oh my lord! He says I drive him crazy?” she said, and then shivered longingly at the thought of lying in his arms.

  * * *

  Duke got back in the car and then said nothing as they backed up and headed home, but Hope wasn’t settling for silence.

  “Is Cathy okay?” she asked.

  “Hmm? Oh…yes, she’s fine. Didn’t appear to faze her. She’s pretty amazing.”

  “I wonder how she got so proficient with guns?” Hope said.

  “Spent the first twelve years of her life living off the grid in Alaska with her parents,” Duke said, and then took off his hat and set it on the seat beside him.