Julia Spencer-Fleming - I Shall Not Want

"I'll be right there. I'm getting into my car right now. You sit still and do whatever the EMTs tell you to. I'll take care of everything else."

"Thank you-" The call went dead. Clare dropped the phone back into her cargo pocket. Swung open the back door and dropped the bag of booze on the floor. She paused, hand in pocket, fingers curled over her keys. She could just get in and drive away. She didn't have to say anything to Russ.

Cowardly , Master Sergeant Ashley "Hardball" Wright, her survival training instructor, sneered.

Rude , Grandmother Fergusson chided.

She turned back to him and was startled to find he had recrossed the parking lot and was a scant few feet away from her again. "I've got to run," she said. "This missioner nun I've agreed to help, Sister Lucia, she's-"

"Been in a single-vehicle accident. It's a bad one. I'm headed there."

"Oh." His phone call. Of course. "I guess I'll see you there."

"I guess I'll take you there." He turned toward his truck, beckoning her to follow him.

"I don't think that's a good idea."

He turned back toward her. "Do you even know where it is?"

"Off the Cossayuharie Road…" Her voice sank as she realized Sister Lucia's description covered a lot of ground.

"I guarantee I can get you there ten-fifteen minutes faster than you would on your own." He shrugged. "But it's up to you." He strode toward the pickup.

She stood, paralyzed, for a second. Don't be stupid , Hardball Wright said. Just walk away , her grandmother urged.

"Wait!" She dashed across the lot. "I'm coming with you."

He let out a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, but kept the same steady pace toward the Ford F-250. By the time he crossed to the driver's side, she had climbed into the cab and was buckled in, staring straight through the windshield as if the Napoli 's Liquor sign were the most interesting thing she had seen all day.

He fired up the truck. Unclipped the light from its mount and, rolling down his window, slapped it on the roof of the cab. "Hold on," he said.

He pulled onto Route 137, accelerating until he was roaring down the county highway at a good twenty miles above the speed limit. He took his attention off the road for a split second, just long enough to glance at her. It was funny. When he'd thought of her these past months-when he'd let himself think about her-it was always as she was the day Linda died: white-faced, bruised, bloody-mouthed. Her eyes going green with horror as she stared at her hands. Oh, my God , she had cried. What have I done?

This Clare's pointed nose and high cheekbones were flush with health. She radiated energy, from her crossed arms to her boots, planted square and firm against the floorboard. Whatever was making her eyes glint brown, it wasn't horror.

"Well?" she demanded.

"Well, what?"

"Aren't you going to tell me it's your fault I'm going into harm's way? That if it hadn't been for you, I'd be in prayer and meditation right now instead of waiting to hear if I'm called up? Aren't you going to take responsibility for me screwing up my pastoral duties, and Linda and her sister dying, and every person you work with and every crime ever committed under your watch and"-she waved a hand at the coffee-colored fields unfolding all around them-"and global warming? Didn't you say we had to have this conversation?"

He did. Except he was going to look like an idiot if he just repeated everything she'd said. Christ, what did he think he was going to achieve by getting her in the truck with him? He should have left her there in the parking lot, her and her spiffy little Subaru and her grocery sack of liquor.

"Don't you worry you might be drinking too much?" he said, seizing on another topic as a man who's run out of ammunition might lay hold of a stick.

"Oh, for-"

They sailed over a rise to face a line of brake lights stretching down to the bottom of the valley. "Shit!" he said. "Hang on!" He stood on the brakes. The pickup skidded, slewed sideways in a shower of gravel and old salt, and came to rest three inches from the back end of a Toyota Corolla, whose driver was watching him with terrified eyes through her rearview mirror.

He turned to Clare. "You okay?"

"Yeah." She patted herself on her chest. Took a breath. "Yeah."

He switched on the siren and inched into the oncoming lane. He could see the obstruction now-some farmer's disk harrow had decided to break down, half on, half off its trailer, and the two pieces of machinery were blocking most of the road. The farmer, who had been shoving fruitlessly at the rear wheel of the harrow, turned to glare at them when Russ rolled to a stop. He turned off the siren but left the lights. Powered down the window on Clare's side.

"Don't you have a hand to help you with that thing?" he said.

"No, I don't have no goddamn hand to help with the goddamn mess! Can't get no goddamn help for love or goddamn money. Goddamn sumbitch a-hole-"

"I'll send somebody from Fire and Rescue." Russ closed the window over a steady stream of profanity and inched past the unsteady tangle, forcing the nearest car to roll most of the way into the drainage ditch to avoid getting clipped. Clare pointed to its driver, who was using body language to let Russ know what he thought of him.

"Another satisfied customer," she said.

"Idiot shouldn't have gotten so close to the accident." He gave the accelerator a little kick. "You got John Huggins's number in your phone?" John Huggins headed up the volunteer Fire and Rescue department.

"Just at home."

He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and handed it to her. "He may already be at the scene of the single vehicle. Tell him he needs to get a couple of his guys over here to direct traffic and help Farmer Greenjeans haul his machinery off the road."

Clare examined his contacts list. "Got it." She dialed, and held the phone to her ear. Once past the remaining stalled cars, Russ sped up. "Uh-no," Clare said, beside him. "It's Clare Fergusson." She glanced at Russ. "He gave it to me. He asked me to-" She sighed. "He's fine. He's sitting right next to me. He handed the phone to me so he could concentrate on his driving."

There was a pause.

"Yes. Is that a problem?" Her voice was sharp. "No, don't answer that. Listen, there's a farmer with a broken down-" She looked over at Russ.

"Disk harrow," he said.

"Disk harrow, about two, two and a half miles east of Napoli 's on the Cossayuharie Road. Russ-the chief wants you to send over a couple of men to help with the situation." With her free hand, she poked at one of the bobby pins that was trying, and failing, to keep her whiskey-and-honey hair in a twist at the back of her head. "I know about that. We're on our way there now." She rolled her eyes at Russ. "Thanks, uh-Mr. Huggins." She thumbed off the phone. "I never know what to call him. He always refers to me as Fergusson."

"I'm sure he'd answer to Chief."

She crossed her arms over her chest again and made a rude noise. "There's only one chief in this town, and he's not it."

He blinked.

"I mean, you can't hang a name on yourself and think it makes you a leader," she said quickly. "You have to make yourself a leader, and then the title just comes naturally. I mean, I can call myself the Grand Duchess Anastasia, but it doesn't-"

"I know what you mean."

Her mouth clicked shut. She made a little hissing sound.

"You know, you can't lead men and women without making yourself responsible for them."

She turned her head away. Looked out her window. The road rose up to meet them, carrying them up into one of the mountainous fingers that pierced the rolling farmlands of Cossayuharie. The air around them darkened as the trees closed in. When she spoke, her voice was almost inaudible. "I never wanted you to lead me," she said to the glass. "I just wanted-"