at her! My grandfather's old cowhide razor strop had more give than that woman!'
Cree knew she couldn't hope to fathom the awful twists and coils of their relationship. She'd always suspected they were lovers, and Mason's treatment of Lupe was among the things that offended her the most about him. And he knew it.
She let her voice get hard: 'Okay, now we've done the courtesies, let's cut to the chase. What do you want?'
'There's a situation that will interest you, here in New Mexico. One that I believe requires your talents.'
'Mason, I'm due to fly back to Seattle tomorrow. I can't just-'
'Of course you can.'
'Sure. And you can cancel your flight to Switzerland and attend to it yourself.'
'It's not a matter of travel itinerary, it's a matter of expertise. I was consulted as a neuropsychiatrist. In that capacity, I have determined that there is no neurological or immediately evident psychological cause for the patient's extreme behavioral aberrations. This is a matter for a different set of talents.'
' Mason-'
'And it involves a child, Lucretia. Obviously, I am not the best confidant for a child already suffering from a surfeit of terror.' His hand made a disgusted gesture at his sagging face and squat body.
'Look, I appreciate your thinking of me. But I… I got very stressed out this spring. I've had some difficult cases recently, and I made a pact with myself to take some personal time.'
'You?' He puffed air out of his lips skeptically. 'What could Cree Black do for 'personal time'?'
She stared at him. 'Maybe I was wrong about you not being a monster.'
But he wasn't baiting her this time, she saw. His voice was sepulchral and his stare without pretense. 'How would you ever grant yourself a respite? There is no respite. Not for people like you and me.'
She almost argued that, no thanks, she was not like him. But his gaze permitted no escape or deflection. And she knew what he meant.
He looked away to look up at the tram station, where a new flock of visitors was disembarking and fanning out at the railings. 'I had another reason for bringing you up here this evening, beyond showing you a majestic view. I wanted to tell you that I've already arranged a meeting between you and the client.' Cree started to protest, but he overrode her: 'Her name is Julieta McCarty, and she's the founder, president of the board, and principal of a little boarding school for Navajo kids. You'll like her-a woman on a mission, just like you. No, don't bristle at me! All you have to do is talk with her, Lucretia. Afterward, you can tell her why your taking some personal time is more important than her whole life and the futures of sixty-odd bright and talented teenagers and the survival of one very special boy in particular.'
Cree crossed her arms against the chill wind and looked away from him. 'You're laying it on pretty thick here, Mason. The Dickensian sentimentality.'
He dropped his voice to an urgent whisper: 'You were right that I'd die to know. Just as you would. This situation at the school-it could be the breakthrough we both want, the one that brings us as close to the other side as we can get without dying ourselves. I'd love nothing more than to take it on. But I am simply not the right one for the job! It requires your talents. Beyond the empathic elements needed, this will take someone physically robust and mobile. Don't pass this up, Lucretia! Don't.'
His intensity gave her pause. If Mason Ambrose said it might be a breakthrough case, he had good reason. She felt the familiar kindling of her senses, the awakening of that ravening curiosity.
But there was no way to communicate how important it was to take the time she needed. Time for life. How last spring in New Orleans she'd realized the full extent to which she'd slipped into obsession, into an emotional world so narrow that she'd become little more than a ghost herself. Preoccupied with death and haunts, with the past. Always looking through but never at the sunlit world of daily, physical life, always straining to see into the twilight that lay beyond. How she was, as Mason said, married to a dead man, unable to live as a flesh-and-blood woman. That she'd been turning into a kind of ghost herself.
It had nearly killed her, but out of the Beauforte House investigation and her unexpected attraction to Paul Fitzpatrick had come a hard-won determination to live. For the first time in the nine years since Mike's death, she had admitted to herself the need to get over him. To shed the confusion and guilt she felt whenever she felt drawn to another, living, man. Taking this case now would mean that once again she was putting life on hold in favor of the afterlife.
'I can't, Mason,' she said finally. 'I'm not going to do this one. I'm truly sorry.'
Mason gave his head a skeptical toss. 'Fine. As I say, you can tell it to Julieta McCarty. That's her now. And she's got the school physician with her-Dr. Tsosie. Excellent!' And he waved to a woman and a man who were descending the ramps toward them wearing expressions Cree knew only too well: the look of people coping, poorly, with the inexplicable.
4
After outrage at Mason's presumption, Cree's first response was surprise at the woman's appearance. Julieta McCarty was tall, narrow waisted, dressed in snug jeans, cowboy boots, a man's blue work shirt, and a denim jacket with cuffs rolled one turn to reveal silver and turquoise bracelets. She had enviably big black hair that tossed freely in the wind, flashing almond-shaped blue eyes, and a tan augmented by a touch of bronze coloring that suggested Native American or Hispanic blood. Cree's first thought was, stunning. Movie star stunning. Definitely not anyone's idea of a typical high school principal. Too curvaceous, too young-no older than her midtwenties.
Seeing her at close range changed Cree's first impression somewhat. Nearer, her real age was evident in her face: closer to forty than thirty. The skin around her eyes and mouth was etched with a skein of fine creases that told of a life in the dry high-desert air and hard sun. Her eyes held a searching look full of wariness, worry, fatigue, doubt, determination.
It was a look Cree had seen in other people trying to deal with an incomprehensible experience, to live when their every belief and expectation had been called into question. It was also a look she saw far too often in the mirror.
The eyes made a twang in Cree's chest, a feeling of such poignancy that she forgot her anger at Mason. In one glance the connection was made, so real Cree could almost see it, a shimmering golden cord arcing between them and binding them together.
Remaining a pace behind Julieta, Dr. Tsosie was a Native American man in his midforties. He wore khakis, jogging shoes, a blue nylon windbreaker parted to reveal a white shirt and a belt cinched by an ornate silver buckle. A beeper and cell phone clipped on the belt marked him as a physician. The brown eyes that shone from under the brim of his cowboy hat were somber and appraising, and though he maintained an impassive face Cree sensed that the root of his current caution was a protective urge: He was looking out for Julieta, determined to help her through whatever crisis she was enduring.
Meeting them, especially Julieta, had a fated, inevitable feel. As they shook hands, Cree inwardly cursed Mason, hating that he could tell exactly how she'd react. That he'd known her for the soft touch she was, that her immediate and overpowering empathy for Julieta would compel her to take the woman's problems as her own.
Mason made only a halfhearted effort to keep the pleasure off his face. Cree wanted to kick him.
'Thank you for coming, Julieta. Joseph, it's a pleasure to see you again.' Mason had conjured his public persona of charm and authority. He pushed back his cuff to glance at his watch and then smiled up at them. 'Shall we stay outside and catch the sunset, or would you like to confer over dinner? I took the liberty of making reservations at the High Finance here-their strip sirloin is quite splendid. In either case, I know Lucretia is eager to hear the specifics of your situation.'
Julieta McCarty admitted that she was too tense too eat, so they opted against dinner. Instead, Cree rolled Mason's chair down another series of ramps to the ridge trail below the restaurant, where they strolled slowly as they talked. The wind had died, but the air was turning chilly; Mason took a blanket from a pouch and arranged it over his legs. Back on the deck, Lupe found a position that allowed her to keep an eye on them, opened a paperback, and pretended to read.
The sun was swelling as it descended, a bloated red balloon just above the horizon. On Sandia crest, the light
