C. Box - Breaking Point

Farkus didn’t mind being called a rube, because even he thought of himself as one.

“Butch,” McLanahan said, almost pleading, “you are an outlaw.”

Butch said, “You never gave a crap about what happened to me or my family.”

“I don’t know all the details,” McLanahan said. “All I know is you’re wanted for a double homicide.”

“You didn’t bother to find out the details,” Butch said. “You did it for the money and the glory.”

“The world’s a cruel place, especially these days.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Butch Roberson said. Then softly, “It doesn’t have to be.”

As they painfully gathered up, Butch ordered Farkus to make sure the fire was doused. He could use the ice water that remained in the cooler, Butch said.

Farkus carried the cooler over and the water sloshed inside. He sat it at his feet and withdrew the useless ball of butcher paper from his pocket. With his back to Butch and McLanahan, he unwrapped it and looked at the markings from the light of the flames.

T-BONE STEAKS

NOT FOR SALE

BIG STREAM RANCH AND CATTLE CO.

He put the paper into the fire, where it was quickly engulfed.

The fire hissed and steamed a pungent cloud when Farkus dumped the cooler on it. As he stirred the dying embers into black viscous soup with a stick, he knew who Butch Roberson’s friend was.

Marybeth Pickett lay fully clothed on her bed with the lights off and her door shut in their bedroom. The sheer curtains undulated slowly on both sides of the open window with a breeze that had changed from warm to cool in the last hour. Coyotes were yipping in the distance, piercing the silence. Their sound was forlorn and high-pitched, and it reminded her of babies shrieking. She stared at the light fixture straight overhead, vowing to take it down soon and clean the dead miller moths out of it. She felt extremely vulnerable and alone.

She’d done all right through dinner, she thought, maintaining a cheerful veneer. She never mentioned the Saddlestring Hotel debacle to the girls and wasn’t sure they’d really understood the details of it anyway-how much it had meant to her.

As she always did, she did a quick mental survey of where each member of her family was at that moment. It was something she did several times a day, and didn’t know if she’d ever be able to break the habit. Lucy and Hannah Roberson were downstairs, watching television. Hannah had asked, once again, if she could stay over. Sheridan was still out with her friends but would be due home soon. April was in her room, sulking, no doubt texting all her new cowboy friends since she’d become so popular with them. And Joe was out there somewhere in the mountains, helping to lead a manhunt for a family friend.

Joe hadn’t called all afternoon or evening, and she assumed he was once again in a place with no cell service. Although she should be used to it by now, it was still tough to be completely out of touch with him. She hoped he felt the same way. He’d said he did.

Throughout the day, Dulcie Schalk had kept her informed about what was going on in the mountains through texts to her phone. Marybeth knew that a command center had been established on the Big Stream Ranch, that Sheriff Reed had been marginalized (Dulcie was furious about that), and that Joe had been asked to lead a small team into the mountains where he’d last seen Butch Roberson. Butch claimed he had taken hostages, which ramped the entire horrible situation to a new level, not to mention that one of the hostages he had was ex-Sheriff Kyle McLanahan. There was some confusion about a report that an innocent hunter may or may not have been killed. Up until she heard about the hostages, Marybeth thought Joe might be able to concoct a way for it all to end peacefully.

She tried not to consider a worst-case scenario where Joe and Butch would be at each other, trying to take the other out. If it weren’t for the worst-case scenarios she’d conjured up over the years that were subsequently dashed by events not quite as dire, Marybeth would have worried herself to death. She thought, as she often did, that wives who didn’t have husbands in law enforcement had no idea how wrenching it could be.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this, she thought. Her mother, Missy, had married up five times and amassed a fortune in money and land. Missy had hoped her daughter would be practical and predatory, but instead she’d married Joe. Marybeth had steeled herself to defy Missy and her ways; to show that happiness and success could be achieved without guile and calculation. And for a while there, Marybeth thought she might win that argument.

She imagined a life where she was back in business-a successful business-and Joe could change jobs. She knew how much he loved being a game warden, but frustrations with the bureaucracy and outright threats to their family over the years had taken a toll.

Sure, the journey of their marriage and their prospects seemed to follow a pattern of one step forward, two steps back. But now, it seemed, they were backpedaling furiously. The Saddlestring Hotel project had offered hope and vindication.

She sat up and rubbed her face with her hands. She hated to think like this. After all, she and Joe had two wonderful daughters they loved and who loved them, and a ward who might have recently turned the corner. The jury was still out on April, of course, and Marybeth hesitated to become too optimistic, but still. .

When her cell phone lit up on the bedstand, she scrambled to it, hoping to see it was Joe. Instead, it read: MATT DONNELL.

She didn’t want to talk to him, and assumed he was calling to console her with his slick realtor talk. He’d wrecked their lives a few hours earlier, and he was the last person she wanted to talk with again. He’d probably be scheming about ways to get around some of the regulations if she’d just hang tight, but she was still too devastated. She let the call go to voicemail.

Marybeth put the phone back down on the bedstand, listened to the chime indicating he’d left a message, and lay back on the bed.

The digital clock read 10:28 p.m.

A minute later, she heard the sound of gravel popping on Bighorn Road and saw the sweep of headlights light up the curtains. The vehicle outside slowed, which piqued her interest, and she heard it pull off the road in front of their house. The engine revved for a few seconds and died as it was turned off.

Marybeth stood and approached the window. She hoped it wasn’t a stray hunter or fisherman stopping at the house to talk to Joe about something. She could never get used to these men, often smelling of cigarette smoke and beer, thinking it was okay to simply drop by any hour of the night. Joe was usually patient with them, which was part of his job, but she wasn’t as patient.

She parted the curtain to see the lights from Pam Roberson’s Ford Explorer go out. She was parked next to Hannah’s car. Marybeth waited for a few moments, expecting Pam to open her door and get out. But for whatever reason, she was just sitting there.

Marybeth clicked on the lights and looked at herself in the mirror over the dresser. Her eyes were dark and gaunt, and she smiled, trying to make herself look and feel happy. She hoped it worked.

LUCY AND HANNAH were huddled together under a light blanket on the couch, watching some kind of awful teen reality show featuring tattooed boys and pregnant sixteen-year-old girls. When Marybeth came down the stairs, Lucy expertly changed the channel to a nature show.

Marybeth said sternly, “You two ought to get to bed,” as she passed them, her way of telling them she didn’t approve of what they’d been watching and hadn’t been fooled by the maneuver.