As he searched for the ignition key on his key ring in the dark in the tiny parking lot behind the Stockman, Joe had an almost disembodied reaction to the sound of approaching footfalls crunching through the gravel, each step gaining in volume, realizing at the last possible second that someone was upon him. He turned with a frown and glimpsed the flash of a meaty fist in the moonlight before it struck him full in the face, the blow so powerful that his world went red and spangling white and his head snapped back and cracked the driver’s-side window of his pickup. He staggered to his left and felt his legs wobble, sidestepping furiously to regain his balance. The man who hit him mirrored his movements and snapped another blow out of nowhere. The explosion Joe felt on his cheekbone was tremendous—it seemed to make his brain erupt with sudden flashes of orange. Blood flooded his nose and filled his mouth from the back of his throat, tasting hot and salty. His legs gave out, and he was down on his hands and knees, gravel digging into the palms of his hands, pebbles under his skin. The attacker stepped back and delivered a kick to Joe’s stomach as if kicking an extra point in football, and Joe felt himself momentarily lifted into the air. When he came down, all his limbs were rubbery and his bloodied face smash into the pavement. His ribs burned and he knew instinctively that a few of them might be broken. He thought: Get under the truck. Roll out of harm’s way. But in his confusion he rolled the wrong way, his arms and legs askew, and he was farther away from his pickup than when he started. That apparently confused his attacker, who yelled, “Stupid fucker,” in exasperation as Joe found himself on the black Doc Marten lace-up boots, stopping Monroe from kicking him again. Monroe leaped back, getting clear, and Joe tried to rise but he couldn’t get beyond a clumsy crouch because his bloodied head swooned, and he rocked back in slow motion and fell, splayed out like a gut-shot animal on the asphalt of the parking lot. Despite the booming pain in his head, Joe thought, You’ve beaten me.
He heard a shout from across the parking lot. Instead of another blow, he heard the slow crunching of gravel as Monroe walked away and Hank saying, in the shadowed distance, “Yeah, that’s enough.”
JOE WAS HELPED to a sitting position. He leaned back against his truck tire. His benefactor was Hank.
“Here,” Hank said, handing Joe a bandanna from his pocket. “Use that to clean off your nose and mouth.”
Joe took it.
“I called the sheriff a minute ago. Somebody ought to be here any minute.”
“You called?” Joe asked.
“Damndest thing,” Hank said, squatting down by him. “When I saw what Bill was doing, I told him to stop and he ran off. I don’t know where he went.”
“You said, ‘Yeah, that’s enough,’ ” Joe said.
“Right.”
“You said it like you ordered and approved of the damage so far.”
Hank cocked his head to the side in an exaggerated way, said, “I have no idea what you mean, Joe. Bill was acting on his own there. If I could find that damned Bill, I’d be the first to testify at his trial that he attacked you for no good reason.”
“Hmmm,” Joe said, not believing Hank, but having no way to prove otherwise.
“‘Hmmm,’” Hank mocked. “Maybe you shouldn’t have called him a rental wrangler, or whatever it was you said. You must have really made him mad.”
“Yup,” Joe said, cringing against a headache that was barreling through his head from the base of his neck.
Deputy Reed pulled into the parking lot. He got out and bathed Joe in the light of his flashlight, said, “Who the hell did this?”
THE NEXT MORNING, a warrant for arrest was issued on Bill Monroe, age unknown, last known address Thunderhead Ranch.
13
ON FRIDAY EVENING, NEARLY A WEEK AFTER THE beating, Joe drove Sheridan to her sleepover with Julie Scarlett on the Thunderhead Ranch, his thoughts echoing what Marybeth had said: This valley is getting too small.
His body still ached each time he turned the wheel of the pickup, even though it turned out his ribs were bruised, not broken after all. But his right eye was still partially swelled shut, and his nose felt detached, as if it were floating around his face like a slow bird, trying to find a place to land.
Joe had spent the last week in the field, repairing fences and signage for public fishing access and walk-in areas. The maintenance needed to be done, but it wasn’t urgent. The primary reason for keeping his distance from town was to avoid anyone seeing him and asking what had happened to him. He knew the beating was already a bit of a joke with McLanahan, who had worked long and hard on a description of what had happened, calling it, “The Fistfight at the KO Corral,” which the sheriff thought sounded western and funny. In a response to an e-mail from Pope asking if Joe was, in fact, injured in a brawl, Joe wrote back: “It takes two to brawl. I’m fine.”
While fixing signs and fence, he had seen no other people, which was how he wanted it. Instead, he stewed and thought about what had happened. He should never have challenged Hank without anything concrete to challenge him with. He had tipped his hand, lashed out because of the Miller’s weasel. Hank was much too experienced in trench warfare, and Joe came off like a rank private. Looking back, he thought of the look in Bill Monroe’s eye, a look of peeled-back hatred that still gave Joe the chills when he recalled it. And the humiliation of being beaten up hung over his head, darkening the sun. He was ashamed, humiliated, violated. The worst thing was when Lucy looked at him at the breakfast table and made a face similar to the one she had displayed when Maxine vomited a bag of jerky on the carpet. Or when Sheridan cocked her head to the side and asked, “Somebody beat you up? Jeez, Dad.” It didn’t help that Marybeth was quietly disdainful of what had happened, shaking her head and expelling a little puff of breath every time she looked at him.
EACH DAY SINCE the beating, Joe had called headquarters and asked for Randy Pope when his e-mails went unanswered. Joe wanted authorization to proceed on the 800-POACHER tip on Hank Scarlett. The director was out of state at a national conference in Cleveland, the receptionist said.
“They don’t have telephones in Cleveland?” Joe asked.
That morning, before leaving his house for the field, Joe called again and got a message on the receptionist’s phone saying she was “either on another line or away from her desk.”
“Joe Pickett here,” he said on her voice mail. “Again. Calling for Randy Pope. Again. Wondering if he realizes he has crossed over the line from bureaucratic micromanagement to obstruction of justice.”
Joe had also called the sheriff’s department throughout the week to check on the status of the investigation into Bill Monroe.
“That Bill done hit the highway” was how Sheriff Kyle McLanahan sized it up.
JOE GLANCED OVER at Sheridan as he drove. Her overnight bag and rolled-up sleeping bag were on the floor. She looked back with an expression that said, “What?”
“I’m taking you to the main ranch house, right?” he said.
“Uh-huh.”
“And there will be other girls there?”
“A few.”
“And the reason we’re going to the main ranch house, not Julie’s father’s house, is that she actually lives at the main house, right?”
Sheridan nodded her head, as if she were engaged in a competition and speaking would make her lose points.