Dana Stabenow - Whisper to the Blood

Greenbaugh gave a thoughtful nod. "I remember now. Your mom's the one stuck you with your grandparents in Arizona. You didn't like it, so you left. This Kate was who you were headed for when we met?"

"Yeah."

"What's she do?"

Johnny shrugged. "Whatever she can do to make a buck." Greenbaugh raised an eyebrow.

Johnny flushed beet red. "Not that!" he said. "Jeez! What I mean is she's like any other Park rat, she hunts, fishes, traps sometimes." Johnny felt Vanessa look at him again, and avoided looking back. He didn't know why he didn't tell Greenbaugh what Kate did for a living. It wasn't like Greenbaugh wouldn't know five minutes after he stepped into the Park. Or even if he stuck around Ahtna long enough.

"Park rat?" Greenbaugh said.

Johnny laughed a little too loudly, relieved at the change of subject. "It's what we call ourselves."

"'Ourselves'?"

"I'm a Park rat now, too," Johnny said, betraying his youth with his pride.

Greenbaugh shrugged. "Okay. Any place decent for a man to stay in Niniltna?"

"Nuh-NILT-nuh," Johnny said again. Again, he hesitated, and then said, "Sure, just ask the way to Auntie Vi's, she runs a B and B in town. I'll tell her you're coming."

"Sounds good. Thanks, kid."

"Thanks for the drinks."

"Be seeing you." Greenbaugh sketched a wave and was gone. Johnny sat back down.

"How do you know him?" Vanessa said.

At that moment Stanislav himself brought out their steak sandwiches, a platter upon which red meat sizzled with a heavenly aroma, and everything else was put on hold.

But Vanessa hadn't forgotten, and on their way home and safely past the Lost Chance Creek Bridge she said, "How do you know that Greenbaugh guy?"

Johnny negotiated a turn with care. "It's just somebody I met on the way home from Arizona. You heard him."

"Hey, look, another moose," Vanessa said. "What's that make, the tenth or twelfth one we've seen today? Annie says when they come down out of the mountains this early it means a long cold winter." She turned to him again. "Come on, Johnny. Who is that guy?"

Johnny sighed. "Okay. Remember I told you my mom sent me to Arizona when my dad died?"

"Yes. You told me the two of you didn't get along."

That was an understatement. "No. We don't." In a burst of candor he added, "I don't think she even liked me that much. Mostly she just used me to piss off Dad."

Van said nothing, and Johnny appreciated her tact. "So when he died, she didn't need me around anymore, so she sent me to her folks in Arizona."

"And you didn't like it there."

"No," he said, very definitely. "So I hitchhiked home. Doyle Greenbaugh was one of the guys who picked me up. He was driving a semi. He picked me up outside Phoenix and took me all the way to Seattle."

"Oh." She digested this in silence for a moment. "So he followed you up here? That's kinda creepy."

Johnny shrugged. "It was a long drive. We talked a lot. He asked me where I was going, and I told him I was going home. He'd never been to Alaska, and he wanted to know what it was like." And he hadn't asked Johnny any uncomfortable questions, like why somebody Johnny's age was standing with his thumb out on an interstate in the middle of the night. "He was a good guy, and he didn't try anything."

She knew a faint chill. "Did someone else? Johnny?"

He shifted in his seat. "Maybe. Yeah." He risked a look at her. "Don't worry, I figured out what was going on in time and I bailed before anything happened."

She swallowed. "That's… that's awful, Johnny."

"Woulda been," he said. "Wasn't. I was careful."

"And lucky."

"And lucky," he said, nodding. He hadn't thought about it at the time, but he'd thought about it after, or he had when Kate had finally stopped yelling at him. He had been very lucky.

Van said, "How come your mom lets you live with Kate?"

"I'm sixteen now, so it's my choice. But before, when I got here? I think Kate blackmailed her."

Van turned her head to stare at him, eyes wide, and grabbed for the dash when the truck jounced through a pothole. "You're kidding."

"Nope."

"What did she blackmail her with?"

"I don't know. I don't want to know. All I cared about was staying with Kate, and Kate made it happen. She made Jane give her custody." He smiled at her. "And here I am."

She drew a deep breath. "Yeah. Yes, you are. Did I say thank you for today? It's been fun."

"Yeah," he said, happily. "It has, hasn't it?"

"Pull over," she said impulsively.

"Huh?"

"Pull over. There, at that trailhead."

"How come?" Johnny said, obediently pulling over and putting the pickup into park.

"So I can do this." She slid across the bench seat and put her arms around his neck. She smiled at him, a little shyly, and kissed him. Her lips were warm and soft, and she smelled faintly of flowers, and maybe a little bit of wood smoke.

"Wow," he said, dazed, when she raised her head.

Her cheeks were pink. "There," she said. "Our first kiss. Now we don't have to fumble around worrying about if you want to, or if I want you to."

"I want to," he said fervently. "I've wanted to for a long time."

"I know," she said. "I wasn't ready."

"It's okay," he said, anxious that she wouldn't take his comment as a rebuke.

"Yes, it is," she said smartly, and he had to laugh.

They drove home in a glow of delicious contentment. They got back to Niniltna at about three thirty, safely past the hour school let out, and they stopped by Auntie Vi's. They found her in her net loft, a length of salmon net draped in front of her, thin green monofilament in a spool at her feet, the needle a blur as she mended the holes put in it by last summer's salmon catch. "Hey, girl," she said as they came up the stairs. "You want job?"

"I've never mended nets before, Auntie," Vanessa said.

Auntie Vi waved a hand. "No problem, I teach. Tomorrow morning, you come." She eyed Johnny. "What you want?"

Wise in the ways of Auntie Vi, Johnny was not put off by this brusque inquiry, and told her she might have a paying guest shortly.

She grunted. "Maybe I got room, maybe I don't."

"Maybe he'll come and maybe he won't," Johnny said promptly.

"You watch that mouth before your elders!" Auntie Vi said, but he saw the corners of her mouth twitch irrepressibly upward as they left.

When he drew up outside Annie Mike's, he made as if to kiss her. She warded him off. "Not where people can see us," she said. "That kind of thing should be private, and personal. Besides, we'd have to answer a bunch of questions, and then Annie'd want to have the talk again, and she'd tell Kate-"

He held up a hand in pretend despair. "Got the picture. I am convinced." He smiled at her. "But you want to."

She laughed, and hesitated. "Listen, Johnny. This Greenbaugh guy?"

"Yeah?"

Her brow creased, and she looked down at her clasped hands. He waited. She looked up and said simply, "He has eyes like a calculator."

There was a brief, startled silence.

"I don't know what that means," Johnny said tentatively. "I'm guessing you don't like him?"

She chose not to answer him, or to answer only obliquely. "He gave you a ride when you needed one, and he didn't try to mess with you. Those are good things."

"But?"

She looked up to give him a grave smile. "I don't know, exactly. I just get the feeling there is a lot more going on there than he lets on."

It was one thing for him to second-guess Greenbaugh's sudden appearance. It was another to fall in with Van's doubts. Johnny snorted. "Him and every second Park rat we know."

"Yeah." She slid out of the pickup. "Thanks again for today. I had a good time."

"Me, too. Tomorrow?"

She shook her head. "I'd love to, but I'm working for Auntie Vi tomorrow."