Chuck Hogan - The Killing Moon - A Novel

“Samantha,” he said, feeling soreness in his cheek between the second and third syllable. It hurt to smile. “And what about you?”

“What about me?”

“You feeling happy?”

Under her straw cowgirl hat, her pretty eyes lacked the sparkle they once held, her spirit of mischief. Maddox felt as though he had taken that away. “I’d like to feel happy,” she said. “I’m trying.”

Footsteps scratched the dirt outside. Mrs. Mithers coming. Tracy looked at Maddox, but without any trepidation or nervousness. She was past all that now.

Instead it was Maddox who readied himself, standing as straight as he could with the cane.

Mrs. Mithers looked in with a smile of greeting, walking up the cow ramp. Maddox presented himself, Tracy signing the introductions.

Maddox took a good look at Tracy’s mother’s face. As with the rest of her generation, she had come late to sunscreen and straw hats. But there was beauty beneath the striations of age and divorce. Enough to make one wonder what difference a good marriage might have made.

Mrs. Mithers signed, and Tracy translated: “How’s your cheek?”

“Not so bad,” he answered. “In a way, after ten years of working undercover, I think I kind of had it coming.”

Mrs. Mithers didn’t know what to say to that.

“Do it too long,” Maddox went on, “and you either burn out or burn up. That’s what I told them at the state police barracks yesterday, when I resigned.”

Tracy turned. She stared at him. “Resigned?”

“They wanted me on a desk. I never did wear the uniform. Seemed strange to start now.”

Tracy kept staring, and Mrs. Mithers had to touch her daughter’s elbow to get her attention. She signed, and Tracy stammeringly translated the question she could not bring herself to ask: “So what are you going to do?”

“Well,” he said, bypassing Tracy and addressing Mrs. Mithers directly, “undergo a little reconstructive surgery, that’s the first thing. Beyond that, it looks like Pinty’s going to need some help getting around for a while. Never mind putting together a competent police force here. I suppose it’s no secret that I still owe this town five years.”

Tracy said, “Five years ?”

“Less six months, for time served. So, four and a half. But after that, believe you me — I am gone. ”

Tracy was still staring at him.

To Mrs. Mithers, he added, “Unless I meet someone. You know. Fall in love. That old trap.”

Tracy pulled her hat off her head and rushed up and squeezed him so tight he staggered back on his cane. She kissed his good cheek, quaking in his arms, crying or maybe laughing. Either way, it was happiness, and Maddox, sore as he was, felt better than he had in a long time.

He buried his nose in Tracy’s hair. She smelled clean and pure.

For aiding and abetting, thanks to Richard Abate, Colin Harrison, Susan Moldow, Robert Shulman, and Trooper John Conroy of the Massachusetts State Police.