Wolf in the Shadows - Marcia Muller [96]
“So where did you stay? Here?”
“Not that night. There isn’t even a hotel in the town, and they shut everything down at sunset. I ended up sleeping on the beach. The next morning, much the worse for wear, I went into the village, bought the sleeping bag and supplies, started asking around about Fontes. Wrong move again. There’s too much money to be had here; the shopkeepers don’t want to gossip or give out addresses—particularly not to a scruffy-looking gringo, even if he’s buying things on a credit card. So I wandered around, pinpointed Vía Pacífica as the most likely area for a guy with a Cessna to live. Spotted these shacks and struck up an acquaintance with people who’ve got no stake in protecting the rich folks.”
Hy’s words were slurred with weariness now. He reached for the wine jug, but then let his hand fall limp to the sleeping bag. I said, “Tell me the rest of it in brief, then get some rest.”
“In brief, I’ve been watching Fontes’s place ever since. No sign of Salazar until he shot me early this morning, although Fontes’s car fetched somebody from the airstrip a couple of hours before Diane Mourning and Ann Navarro showed up last night. The way I figure it, Salazar made a quick return trip to San Diego on Tuesday night or sometime before you saw him on Wednesday, then came back late on Friday.”
“Why, I wonder?“
Hy shrugged.
“He shot you because he caught you prowling around there?“
“Caught and recognized me. Brave fellow that I am, I ran like hell again. He fired three times, the second shot winged me.”
“I’ll bet that was the shooting incident he was acting out tonight for Mourning and Navarro’s benefit.”
“Probably. Don’t know why he’s so proud of it; he has to realize he didn’t kill me.”
“I think the purpose of telling about it was to intimidate the women.”
“He succeed?”
“Scared Mourning. Navarro just seemed disgusted.”
“Huh. Well, McCone, that’s my story. Today I just hung around the riverbed, letting Sofia doctor me and … oh, hell, probably feeling sorry for myself. And then I looked down the beach and saw you, sitting there on that ponga, so nonchalant and confident.”
“I’m not at all sure about the nonchalant and confident part,” I said, “but obviously you were surprised.”
“You know, I should’ve been, but I really wasn’t. Maybe I knew you’d be along sooner or later.” He placed his hand high up on my thigh, fingers taut, almost hurting me. “Jesus, I’ve missed you.”
“Missed you, too. When I thought you were dead … I don’t want to remember that.” I turned my head, pressed my lips against his neck, desire flooding my body.
He said, “D’you understand why I feel like an asshole, McCone?”
“You shouldn’t. What went wrong wasn’t anything you could control. And any intelligent person would’ve turned tail and run from Salazar.”
“I don’t know.” He pulled me down until we were lying flat. “I don’t know, McCone,” he repeated, “I’m just not the man I used to be.” Then his head flopped onto my shoulder, his breath deepened and slowed, and he fell asleep.
I lay holding him, my cheek against his shaggy hair, tamping down desire. His heart beat strong and steady, his breath came regularly, but every now and then he’d moan softly or twitch.
I tightened my arms around him. Silently told him, You’re twice the man I thought you were. I takes one hell of a man to admit his mistakes, an even better one not to make excuses for them.
All of which led me to suspect that what had happened in the nine years he refused to share with me was very bad indeed.
Twenty-Three
Sunday, June 13
Hy tossed and mumbled most of the night, but he slept on. My own rest was fitful. A couple of times I got up to use the facilities—as my mother would say, even in a situation like this when the facilities were a clump of Indian tobacco a few yards from the shack. The second time, at around five in the morning, I couldn’t bring myself to go back inside right away and went to sit on the hood of the Tercel, breathing the cold sea air and listening to the silence.
That was one thing