Shooting Starr

her counting under her breath as he quickened his own pace to catch up with her.

“I’ve been thinking about me-that’s all. Myself. Being blind. Worrying about whether I’m going to see again. Oh, damn.” She halted and threw up her arms with a cry that was half a sob. “Where are they?”

Ignoring the question, which made even less sense than the rest of what she’d said, C.J. said in bewilderment, “Jeez, Caitlyn, why shouldn’t you? That’s a hell of a lot for anyone-”

“Yeah?” A look-silver daggers-slashed past his shoulder. “So I’m blind-big deal. At least I’m alive. What about Mary Kelly? Where is she? She’s dead.” Her eyes darkened, and without their silvery flash her face became a mask. She turned away from him, thickly muttering, “Where are the damn steps? I counted-they should’ve been here. Dammit, where-”

“Your vector’s a little off,” C.J. said with dazed relief. This, at least, was something he could deal with. “You missed by about ten feet. If you come around to…oh, say two o’clock-”

She came around, all right, but not toward the house. She kept right on coming until the sheaf of wildflowers whacked him in the chest, and her face, uplifted to his, was a mask of grief. “Mary Kelly’s dead,” she whispered through lips that barely moved. “I had her blood all over me. I didn’t-I never-”

Her face crumpled. With an anguished cry she turned and stumbled away from him, fleeing blindly across the lawn, leaving wildflowers scattered like jackstraws at his feet.

Chapter 11

He was sitting in the front porch rocker when his mother came out with her Sunday dress on to tell him she was heading off to church.

“Well, aren’t those pretty,” she said when she saw the flowers in his lap.

He nodded glumly. “Caitlyn picked ’em.”

“By herself?”

“Yep.”

“Bless her heart.” His mother moved to the top of the steps. “Where is she?” she asked, surveying the empty yard. “I didn’t hear her come in the house.”

The chair creaked as C.J. tipped it forward. He stared down at the flowers dangling between his knees and muttered, “I don’t know, she’s out there somewhere.”

“By herself?”

“Yep.” The chair creaked again as he leaned back in it and defiantly met his mother’s mildly disapproving look.

“You think that’s a good idea?”

He shrugged and scowled down at the wildflowers, noticing as he did that they were looking somewhat the worse for wear. He picked at a floppy daisy and his heart grew heavier. “Probably not. However, she definitely does not want me with her. She’s grieving,” he said, and took a long breath that didn’t do much to ease the tightness in his chest. “For Mary Kelly.”

“That’s the woman that was killed?” C.J. nodded. “Well,” his mother said after a moment, “she needed to.” She settled herself against the porch railing and hooked her pocketbook over her arm as if she meant to stay awhile. “I expect she’d like some comfort, though, no matter what she told you.”

“It wasn’t what she said,” C.J. said bleakly. “It was the way she looked.” He was surprised when his mother laughed and made a “shame on you” sound with her tongue.

“Son, I’m afraid you don’t know very much about women.”

He didn’t like hearing that, even if it was true. “Well, shoot, Momma,” he said, bristling, “I know enough to know when I’m not wanted-or needed.”

“You do, do you?”

He was getting tired of being the source of his mother’s amusement but knew better than to say so. Instead, he whacked the flowers across his knee without much regard for their condition and muttered bitterly, “That is the strongest, most independent, stubborn and bullheaded-”

“Whoa, now. That’s a lot for one woman to be, and not necessarily all bad.”

“Well, it ain’t all that good, either,” C.J. growled.

“So,” said his mother, ignoring his grammatical lapse, “I guess that means you’d like a woman to be weak, clingy and wishy-washy?”

He snorted, though he could feel a lightening of his spirits and a grin trying hard to break through. “After growin’ up in this family? Momma, I’ve never even met a woman who fit that description.” He paused to think about it, and the heaviness settled back around his heart. “No, I don’t want that. Of course I don’t. I just want-” What any man wants. He stopped, frustrated, because he didn’t know how to say it. Or didn’t want to say it, not out loud. To be needed…wanted. To be, for one person, at least, big shot…superhero…knight in shining armor…the alpha and omega. The light in one particular woman’s eyes.

“You want to be her hero,” his mother finished for him, but her voice was gentle and for once her eyes weren’t smiling.

He let his breath out in a gust of exasperation. “Momma, you’re always sayin’ that, but that’s not what I mean. It’s not what I mean at all.” He aimed a scowl at her and hoped he was going to be able to tell her what he did mean without making a damn fool of himself. No man wants to look like a fool, even to his momma. “I’d be happy just being her friend, if she’d let me. All I want to do is help her get through this. Sure, I’d like to be able to fix everything for her, put everything back the way it was. And, okay, I know I’m not gonna be able to do that, but at least I’d like to-” he swallowed hard, lifted a hand and finished lamely “-be there for her. You know?”

“Calvin.” His mother straightened up and walked over to him. Her hand rested briefly on the back of his neck, then moved to his shoulder and gave it a little squeeze. “What on earth do you think being a hero is? ”

He looked up at her and frowned. And what did she do? Just smiled back at him, then turned and started down the steps. He was about to yell at her in protest for leaving him with an exit line like that one, but after the first step she stopped abruptly and hesitated a moment before turning halfway back to him. The protest he’d planned died on his lips; the look on her face was one he’d never seen before.

“Son, your daddy was a hero to me every day of his life. Did I need him to take care of me? I most certainly did not. I was a strong and independent woman when I met him-I had a college degree and a good job teaching school. Did I need him? No more than I needed sunshine, and air to breathe. He worked hard, your daddy did-he was away a lot, driving trucks, and Lord knows it’s a good thing I’m as strong and independent as I am or I don’t know how I’d ever have been able to raise seven children with him gone so much of the time. But he loved me and he loved his kids, and let me tell you, he never thought he was too much of a man to fix a meal or change a diaper or put a load of laundry in the washing machine, either! Lord knows he had his faults. He wasn’t perfect, but that didn’t matter.” She paused, a fierce light shining in her brown eyes and spots of color showing through the face powder on her cheeks, and when she spoke again her voice was husky and uneven. “I’ll forgive a man a lot, for his eyes lighting up every time he sees me.”

She stomped on down the steps and around the corner of the house to where the cars were parked and didn’t look back or wave goodbye.

C.J. sat where he was with his forearms on his knees and a bunch of wilted wildflowers drooping in his hands and watched her car back out onto the lane, then head off toward the highway. After a while he took a big breath and brushed at something that was crawling down his cheeks-some kind of bug, he told himself.

Yeah, that’s what it was. Had to be.

Scaredy-cat, Caitlyn scolded herself. The voice in her head kept time with the scuffing sounds her feet made as they felt their way along the gravel track, like a schoolyard taunt: Scaredy-cat, scaredy-cat, ’fraid of the dark.