Piper eyed him.
“I was driving up this road here. Right here.”
“I’ve heard it,” she said, stopping him dead in his tracks.
She stared at his eyes, watching the circuits behind them scramble.
“Excuse me?” he asked. When he looked at her it was like they were meeting for the first time again.
She turned away, looking back out at the landscape, ignoring the wave of anger that washed over her. She pushed it down, out of the way, adding to the diamond-dense ball of pent up loathing for this sliver of God’s country she found herself in. The shaft of light disappeared, pinched off by the clouds.
She thought about the way the sheriff had looked down on her up in that parking lot. Just when she’d thought he was beginning to respect her, he showed his true colors. He was just like the rest of them. Just like her brother. They were all out there taking care of their own, and if anyone or anything ever threatened their climb up the ladder, they stepped on your back and shoved you down, put you in your place, leaving you behind to claw your way. Alone.
They were all cowards.
“I…” her father said. “I…”
“You what?” Her voice shook. “What!”
Her voice echoed back to her from the trees, and that broke the dam. She opened the front door and walked inside as the tears flowed down her face. “Damn it,” she said, growling the words.
With blurred eyes she set to cleaning the rest of the dishes that sat in the sink, and when those were done she re-cleaned the already clean ones on the towel.
All the while her father stood out there, staring into the distance with that pathetic air.
She scrubbed the stubborn streaks of blackened steak stuck to a platter, rubbing her fingers raw on the wiry sponge. She ran the coffee mugs under scalding hot water, welcoming the burn on the backs of her hands, not bothering to lower the temperature.
She shut off the water, and with closed eyes took deep breaths, just like she’d learned in yoga. Five seconds in, hold, seven seconds out. After a time she opened her eyes and caught her reflection in the window.
She had Tammy Faye Bakker-style twin streaks of black mascara running down her cheeks. She smiled and then chuckled at the sight. She wiped her hands, grabbed a handful of tissues, and wiped her face.
“Oh, you’re a mess, Piper,” she told herself.
Sucking in a deep, cleansing breath, she went to the window again and looked out on her father. His lips were moving as he stared out into the distance. What a sad sight was all she could think. But was he sad? It sure didn’t look like it. His eyes were steely, and he had a clever smirk on his face. He was impressing whoever he was talking to right now.
She put on a fleece, pulled his off the hook, and went out onto the porch.
Again, he looked at her the way somebody does when they’re trying to remember your name, but she ignored it.
“Here, Dad.” She put his fleece over his shoulders. “It’s cold.”
“Thanks, honey.”
She reached up and rubbed his shoulders. “How’s the view?”
“It’s absolutely wondrous,” he said.
She smiled at the amazement in his voice. He’d never described it like that before.
"Have I ever told you how I found this property?" he asked.
"No,” she said, lying momentously. “How?"
He smiled, a conspiratorial glint in his eye. "I came up from Summit one day. I was driving my old silver Chevy.”
She remembered sitting on the center console of that silver Chevy Blazer as they drove around the dirt roads spidering through the mountains, without even a thought of a seat belt, her older brother next to her in the passenger seat.
“I came around the corner and there was this “for sale” sign hanging on a rickety old barbed wire fence.” Her father smiled. “And I tell you what, behind it I could see this house right here, the one I built ten years later with my own two hands, I saw it as if it was already built. I could literally see it.”
He turned to her, his eyes alight.
She smiled again and nodded. “Yeah?”
"I got on the phone and I dialed the number on the sign, and I said, 'Where can I find you? I want to sign the papers right now. I'm buying it.' The guy was down at the bar. Said to come on over. He was having a drink.”
Piper smiled, picturing her father.
He continued on giving his account of the shots of tequila, the beers, sleeping in his silver Chevy on the side of the road, waking up with that wicked hangover and a signed contract to buy the land. About her mother being distraught, not wanting to leave her life in Breckenridge, but how she had been convinced with one trip to this place. This beautiful place.
Piper asked all the right questions, keeping her father on track, pausing in all the right places, sighing in awe at his retelling of the yarn that had remained constant, word for word, for seventeen years.
"It took me two years, twenty-six months," her father said. “But the dream was realized.” He held up his hands and turned toward the house. “And here it is.”
He turned back to the land, and his eyes glazed over again, and she knew he’d reached the end of the strand of memory.
The clouds had moved north, leaving the afternoon sun to shine brightly on most of the now glistening valley.
She threaded her arm through his and steered him around. “Let’s go inside then.”
“That’s a good idea.”
“Yes, Dad,” she said. “Let’s get you back in your home.”
Chapter 21
Wolf stood up from his desk and bent over to touch his toes. When he reached the middle of his shins the pain in his hamstrings and lower back was too much, so he rose up and opted for a pace around the office
