A Soldier in Conard County Read online

  “Does the darkness bother you?”

  “Depends.” He shrugged one shoulder. “It can be a friend or an enemy. Driving down back roads could be dangerous, though. Sometimes they provided a perfect opportunity for ambush. And headlights didn’t always catch the IEDs.”

  Improvised explosive devices. She knew the term from the news, from Al and from how Al had died. A cold little shiver ran down her spine.

  “I vastly preferred to be on foot,” Gil added truthfully, then said no more. There was no need to say more. She had her answer, a truthful one even if it was abbreviated. On foot, especially, the darkness was his friend.

  But he’d hovered close enough to memory’s precipice. Now that he’d told her what had happened, he wanted to change the subject. They were sitting here in a brightly lt diner over coffee and pie. No reason not to enjoy it. “Do you like teaching music?”

  “I love it,” she said with a smile, a tiny spot of ice cream in the corner of her lips. As if she sensed it, she pulled a fresh paper napkin from the dispenser and dabbed her mouth. Too bad, he thought. He’d have liked to lick it away. And she would have justifiably objected. He enjoyed some internal amusement at his own expense. Here he was, too tired most of the time to do more than sit or pace, with a mangled body, and his genitals wanted to rise to the occasion. Miri was having an unusually strong impact on him. If he’d been capable of carrying out his desires, he’d have been smart to move to the motel.

  But he was no threat to her, he assured himself. Al’s cousin. A deep bond he still honored, and that extended to respecting Al’s family.

  Chapter Three

  Miri watched him turn his attention to his pie, realizing that the man who had brought Al home really was as reserved and distant as he had seemed that day. He hadn’t been controlling his emotions in order to carry out his duty to Al. No. This guy never unleashed any real feeling if he could avoid it. Was he that worried or uncomfortable with his emotions? Did he live behind walls on purpose or by conditioning? She guessed she would never know. Sergeant Gil York had no intention of exposing himself.

  “I always loved music,” she said, to cover her rather brief response to his question. “I was lucky in that I could play almost any instrument I picked up. Not well enough to claim a position with a band or orchestra or anything, like I said.” Then she laughed quietly at herself. “Maybe because I never focused on one instrument. Anyway, I was lucky to be good enough to teach it. Although when you have to learn your art as a craft, it makes a difference.”

  That caught his attention. “How so?”

  She tilted her head. “Well, it’s one thing to just play from the heart with joy. It’s another to break all that down into theory and methods and so on. Teaching makes me be more conscious of the process. Sometimes it can be hard to shake off, enough to just play without ever thinking about it.”

  He nodded slowly.

  “We have a writer in this county, Amanda Laird. She once told me that her writing gets messed up for weeks if people start talking about how to do it. She doesn’t even like to go to the schools to talk to English classes. And she’s death on the idea of themes.”

  “Meaning?”

  Miri flashed another smile. “She says she hates being asked what the theme of her book is. She doesn’t consciously plan one, and she gets the biggest kick out of the way her readers participate in the creation by coming away with different reactions and interpretations. So I’m a music teacher and that keeps me out of the clouds, because I have to pass along important basics. What I hope is that my students, after we get past the basics, can use their music to fly again.”

  One corner of his mouth lifted. “I like that phrasing. I hope they fly again, too.”

  She dared to ask a question that might turn him once again into granite. “Do you ever get to fly?”

  “Only on a troop transport or a helicopter.” Then he resumed eating his pie, leaving her feeling like he’d just frozen the conversation.

  Then she considered what Gil did for a living. She doubted he could afford to let his head wander in the clouds at all. Ever. His dreams had become a harsh reality, and now there was no room for dreams anymore.

  Al had given her the same feeling on his visits. A realist at all times. He hadn’t even seemed to want to talk about memories of their childhood, although he occasionally made an effort. Effort being the operative word, she thought now.

  “Do you guys never think about the future?” she demanded finally.

  “Of course. We have to plan ahead.”

  And that probably said it all. This far and no further. Not five years down the road, but a few weeks down the road. A very narrow telescope for life.

  Yet how else could they survive?

  She stifled a sigh, spooned the last bit of melting ice cream from her bowl and sipped coffee that was growing cold. That caught her attention immediately. Maude never let coffee get cold.

  She looked around and saw that Maude was nowhere in sight. As uneasiness struck her, she said to Gil, “I’ll be back in a moment.”

  Then she ventured into the dragon’s lair of the kitchen that served the diner. There she found Maude on the floor, breathing too rapidly, sweat beading her brow. Miri called out instantly. “Gil!”

  “Yo?”

  “Call 9-1-1 now!”

  “I’ll be okay,” Maude groused, in a voice that was way too weak.

  “Sure you will, Maude. But you need someone to look at you. Something’s wrong.”

  But she knew what was wrong as Maude lifted a hand and rubbed the center of her chest.

  “Never felt it coming,” Maude whispered.

  “Women often don’t. Just take it easy for now. Soon the medics will be here and you can yell at them.”

  “Call Mavis. Number by the sink. She’s gotta close up.”

  “Relax. I’ll get Mavis. She’ll take care of everything. Half the folks in town will probably help take care of everything. You just take it easy until a doc says you’re fine.”

  The call to Mavis was unexpectedly easy. As taciturn as her mother, she said she’d come right away. No histrionics.

  Then Miri sat on a recently mopped, still-damp floor and took Maude’s hand, watching intently for a change, ready to crawl out of her skin as she waited.

  Gil had limped to the doorway and was talking into his cell phone. “Maude at the diner. Yes. She’s gray, sweaty and lying on the floor. Still breathing. Conscious.”

  “Dammit,” Maude whispered.

  “I agree,” Miri answered. She gave Maude’s hand a small squeeze. “Hang on. You’ll be around to grouse at another generation of customers.”

  “I’ll wait by the front door to wave them through,” Gil said. Miri was glad he didn’t add that every second counted.

  Because it did, and this county wouldn’t be the same without the irascible Maude.

  * * *

  It took only six minutes for the paramedics to arrive. Mavis, a younger clone of her mother, wasn’t far behind. She took over the task of reassuring Maude, while the medics started an IV and took vitals, talking with someone at the hospital over the radio.

  “What can I do to help?” Miri asked as the medics finally wheeled Maude out.

  Mavis looked almost lost. She shook herself. “Nothin’,” she said. “Mom had most of it done. I just need to take care of the register and lock everything up. Then I can go to the hospital.”

  “Okay.”

  “Guess I should put the Closed sign up. Whatever, ain’t likely to be serving breakfast by six.”

  “No.” Miri studied Mavis, seeing the near panic in the woman’s eyes and the confusion as she tried to absorb everything and make plans. All she wanted to do was follow her mother to the hospital.

  “You’re sure I can’t close up for you?” Miri offered.

  Ma
vis shook her head. “You run on home. I’ll do it, won’t take long...”

  Then she walked to the front door to watch the ambulance pull away, before returning to the back of the diner. “You run home,” she said again.

  Miri couldn’t mistake that Mavis wanted to do this by herself. Maybe needed to do it, just so she’d be busy.

  Miri grabbed a receipt book and scribbled her number on it. “You need anything at all, let me know. I mean it.”

  “Thanks.” Mavis looked at the pad, but hardly seemed to see it.

  Then there was nothing to do but go home with Gil.

  * * *

  When they arrived at Miri’s house, she was surprised to see how early it still was. Well, of course, they’d left the Baker ranch as it started to get dark and cold, which was early at this time of year. Then the long drive into town, stopping at Maude’s apparently just after dinner hour, judging by how empty the place was.

  So Miri shouldn’t have been surprised when she looked at the clock for the first time since morning and realized it was just past eight. Maude would have expected to be open until ten tonight, and to reopen at six in the morning.

  Miri didn’t know how the woman kept such hours, even now that she had the help of her daughter. But maybe she’d just seen the effects of having no life except work.

  She shucked her jacket and flopped on one edge of the couch, leaving it to Gil to decide what he would do. She was disturbed again, but for a very different reason. Now she was thinking about Maude.

  “I’m sorry about your friend,” Gil said. He’d doffed his parka and now settled with evident caution into the rocking chair.

  “She’s not my friend. I’m not sure she’s anyone’s friend, but she sure as heck is an icon in this county.”

  Gil shifted his weight onto his other side, as if he couldn’t quite get comfortable.

  “If that chair’s not good for you, there’s room over here.”

  He shook his head. “I’m fine. And I’d venture to say Maude must have had a friend at one time. She has a daughter.”

  Miri couldn’t help laughing. “True. And she has two daughters, actually. A few years back, the other one was here for a few months helping at the diner, then she took off. I’ve no idea where. But there was always a possibility that Maude simply cloned herself.”

  It was his turn to smile. “Having met Mavis, I’d agree that’s a possibility.”

  Miri closed her eyes a moment, remembering. “Do you think she had a heart attack?”

  “I’m not a doctor, but that would be my first guess. It could probably be other things, though.”

  “If she eats what’s on her menu, it’s probably the heart. But what a delicious menu. Her steak sandwiches are famous. You need to try one.”

  Then she heard her own words, implying he’d be around long enough to do that. Hell, she thought sadly, he was probably already on some kind of internal countdown clock, getting ready to move on. Staying in one place for long didn’t seem like a quality that being in the Green Berets would nurture.

  “Al got antsy when he was home for more than a week or two,” she remarked, even though it would sound like a total tangent to him. “He’d help his dad with everything, including livestock, and do a lot of visiting, but even so I could tell he wanted to get back to work. You must be miserable.”

  “I wouldn’t say that.” Gil paused as if choosing his words. “After a while the unit becomes your family. Then we have certain ways of doing things that feel orderly to us for the most part. It becomes comfortable. Being away from it is like...”

  “Being a stranger in a strange land?”

  “Sort of like that, yes. But that doesn’t mean I’m miserable. I’ve traveled through so many cultures in my career that the worst I could say is that this is just another one. We become chameleons. As for Al...” He shrugged slightly. “It’s harder to come back to a familiar place.”

  “Is that what you felt at home in Michigan?”

  “Not exactly. My parents moved to Lansing about ten years ago, from Traverse City. It wasn’t my childhood home I went back to. I just went back to the same complaints and pressures.”

  “I guess they aren’t getting the message.”

  “Apparently not.” He passed a hand over his face, as if wiping something away. “They’ll get their wish soon enough, one way or another. Either I’ll be judged unfit to continue on duty, or I’ll retire at twenty. Not long now. But I’m not going back to Lansing.”

  “You don’t like it?”

  “I’m too old to go back to living near my parents. I can’t be their kid again.”

  “Ah.” She thought she got it. Evidently they still wanted him to be the child they remembered, not the man he’d become, and hadn’t adapted to his being grown-up. She guessed he hadn’t been around long enough for them to get used to the changes. She’d seen it from time to time, when grown children had some difficulty carving out a different relationship with their parents. She would have thought it would be easier for someone who was away as much as Gil.

  For that matter, coffee and pie hadn’t made Gil look any less weary.

  “Gil, you don’t have to stay up on my account. If you’re tired, go to bed. I’m used to being on my own most evenings.”

  He nodded, but didn’t move for a minute or so. “Thanks for your hospitality,” he said at last, then pushed himself to his feet, reaching for his cane. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She watched him limp from the room and listened to his uneven gait as he walked down the hall. The man who had marched so firmly and confidently when he’d been here for Al’s funeral now walked unevenly and with much less confidence.

  God, apart from his injuries and the pain he appeared to still suffer, the changes must be hard to live with. She hoped they were temporary.

  She’d forgotten to get her laptop and lesson plans from the bedroom, so she flipped on the TV to some program she hardly watched. Maude. Gil.

  A lot to worry about for one day. But she was having a serious problem dealing with finding Maude on the floor like that. The woman had seemed indestructible, as if she’d always be a part of this place. Nothing would be quite the same around here without her. Mavis, though she was a lot like her mother, really wasn’t the same.

  Swinging around, Miri put her feet up on the couch and leaned back against the padded arm. She felt tired, too. Drained.

  She hoped tomorrow would be better. Then she drifted off to sleep.

  * * *

  It was still dark in the morning when she woke. Gil evidently wasn’t stirring yet, so she made her way to her own room, took a shower and changed into fresh clothes, a sweater and slacks. In the kitchen she flipped on the radio at a low volume to listen to the weather. Not that she really needed it. The heat was blasting in the house, and there was a chilly draft near the window over the sink. The winter cold had returned overnight. Silently, which seemed strange, but it had come.

  She would have expected some wind, she thought as she waited for the coffee and made herself some whole grain toast. A little bluster. Almost as soon as she thought it, she heard the window glass rattle quietly. There it was. Satisfied that her weather sense hadn’t flown the coop, Miri stood staring out at the still-dark world while she nibbled her toast, wondering how soon she could call and find out how Maude was doing.

  A lot of people would be in for a shock today. Never in the history of the diner had it been closed in the morning. There’d be no coffee, no toast, no scrambled eggs and ham, nothing for the regulars, mostly retired, who camped out there every day, and nothing for the church crowd that occasionally stopped in with their families. The diner wasn’t that big, but on Sunday mornings it could groan with all the people.

  None of that this morning. Mavis would be tied up at the hospital, most likely, and there was no one else to keep up the flo
w. Miri hoped Mavis had remembered to call the dishwasher, Maude’s only regular employee these days, and tell him he wouldn’t be needed.

  And all of this was pointless mental buzz, she thought as she took her half-eaten toast and coffee to the table. The diner wasn’t her problem. She was concerned about Maude, naturally, but the rest of it...not her concern.

  What concerned her was the man sleeping in her office-slash-bedroom, who’d looked almost hollow-eyed last night. As if he were running on his last reserves. She hoped he stayed a few days to catch up with himself before he took to the road again.

  But it wasn’t just that. Uncomfortable as it made her feel, she squarely faced the fact that she was attracted to Gil, had been since the funeral and still was even in his beat-up state. She’d been shoving it aside as totally inappropriate and most likely a waste of energy, but the fact remained that she felt seriously drawn to him.

  Like she needed that.

  At last the weather report emerged from the radio. Not surprisingly, the thaw was indeed over. What she hadn’t expected was to hear that the temperature was going to plunge precipitously throughout the morning, reaching below zero around noon. And more snow. While the percentages were far from definite, they faced the possibility of a blizzard later, too.

  Great. Well, if Gil had any ideas about hitting the road today, he was going to be disappointed. With sufficient wind, two inches of snow could become a blizzard around here, creating a nearly total whiteout. Sensible people would hunker at home, starting this afternoon.

  The phone rang and she snatched it quickly. There was an extension in her office that could easily wake Gil.

  “Hey, kiddo,” said one of her fellow teachers, Ashley Granger McLaren. “Looks like the weather is mad at us again.”

  “Or decided to return to normal,” Miri answered drily. “So what’s up?”

  “I heard something on the grapevine about Maude. What’s going on?”