“First you were thinking how much you loved me, which made me remember that I felt something kind of similar about you.”
“Bastard.” She gave him the finger. “Wish I hadn’t told you my secret. Go on.”
“You were thinking that this seemed like a nice place to settle and raise a family.”
Krysty’s smile vanished as quickly as a late frost off a summer pasture. “Yes,” she said, the single word flat and dull, like a spade full of wet earth on a coffin lid.
“Well,” he said defensively, “you were. I knew you would. Anytime we come across somewhere like this woods, water, sun, mountains and all that shit”
“All that shit ?”
“You know what I mean, Krysty. And don’t get pissed at me, because I feel the same.”
“Do you, Ryan?”
” ‘Course.”
“But?”
“But what?”
“There always has to be a ‘but,’ doesn’t there, lover. What is it?”
Ryan sat up and looked around. “You used that word” He thought about it. “Sounded like idle?”
“Idyll?”
“Yeah. Something that’s triple ideal. Way this region seems. But it never has been. All of the other times and all the other places.”
“There’s always a worm at the heart of the apple, you mean, lover?”
“Something like that. Evil and death. A rotting skull underneath a pretty Mardi mask. I’ve had my hopes raised a few times in my life. Don’t like the feeling.”
“Fair enough.” The smile was back again, tenderness in the fathomless green eyes. “Let’s spend awhile in this particular paradise and see how it goes.”
“Sure. It’s such a good place, brimming with game, fish in the lake. Could stay here a week or so.”
“That would be What?”
Ryan had jumped to his feet, staring through the fringe of trees toward the lake. “Heard something.”
Simultaneously they both heard the sound of Dean’s voice, calling out in alarm, and a sinister, snarling noise.
“Wolf?” Ryan asked, drawing the SIG-Sauer and running to the side of the lake, looking to the left. Krysty was at his heels, Jak close behind. The others only just started to waken from steep.
The boy was at the edge of the water, backing away toward the camp, crouching, his right hand held out defensively. He was around a hundred paces off, but Ryan could see the bright flash of silver off the blade of the knife and the sparkle of the turquoise from the hilt.
The animal facing Dean was nearly as big as a full-grown timber wolf, but it looked to Ryan more like a German shepherd. It was belly down, looking ready to spring, its red-rimmed eyes fixed on its prey. The brindled coat was marked by three distinctive white blazes on its chest, like stars. It was growling deep in its throat as it crept closer to the boy.
“Get the rifle,” Ryan said to Krysty. “Best chance.”
“No,” Mildred breathed, arriving with Trader, J.B. and the others. “Mine.”
Trader had his Armalite, and he shouldered the woman aside. “Boy’s part in line of fire. Won’t do anything with that fucking little gaudy toy. I’ll take it out.”
Ryan glanced sideways, seeing that Mildred had already drawn the six-shot revolver she always carried, the Czech ZKR 551, chambered to take the big Smith amp; Wesson round.
He’d watched J.B. fieldstrip the weapon, admiring the solid frame side rod ejector and the practical shortfall thumb-cocking hammer.
And he’d seen what Mildred could do with that special blaster.
“She shoots, Trader.”
“Does she fuck?”
Dean had jabbed out quickly at the dog, holding off a charge, making it wait a little longer. But time was passing and time was lifeblood.
Ryan felt the old familiar crimson mist of blind anger seeping over his mind. He cocked the 9 mm P-226 and jammed it into Trader’s side.
“She shoots,” he said through gritted teeth, knuckle white on the trigger.
Trader said nothing, his whole body stiffening, eyes narrowing, lips peeling back in a feral snarl of anger. But he didn’t try any movement.
“Do it, Mildred,” Ryan whispered.
“Killing your son,” Trader breathed.
Mildred stood very still, shuffling her boots in the shingle to gain a sure purchase. She lifted the revolver in her right hand, staring down the barrel, two-eyed, took a single breath and held it for several seconds.
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