A Soldier's Homecoming. Rachel Lee

       Chapter Two

      Gage Dalton, Conard County’s new sheriff—for three years now, which he guessed meant he would always be the new sheriff—sat at his desk reviewing reports, his scarred face smiling faintly as he remembered how Nate Tate used to complain about the paperwork. Nate had been sheriff for thirty-five years, a long time to complain about paperwork. As for Gage, he would count himself lucky if twenty years from now he was still the new sheriff and still doing paperwork.

      Not that folks gave him a hard time or anything. It was, he supposed, just their way of distinguishing him from Nate. He signed another report and added it to the stack of completed work.

      Not much happened in this county on a routine basis. Cattle disappeared or were killed under strange circumstances. That whole cattle-mutilation thing still hovered around, leaving questions whose answers never entirely satisfied the ranchers.

      Break-ins, vandalism—more of that over the past few years as the county grew and bored youngsters got ideas from movies, television and gangsta rap. Although, to his way of thinking, the growing size of the younger population probably meant that, percent-age-wise, there was no more crime than ever.

      There were new jobs, though. When he’d first moved here fifteen years ago, the county had been losing many of its young folks to brighter city lights. Then the lights here had grown a bit brighter when a semiconductor plant was set up outside town. Easier work than ranching. Good wages. Folks had moved in, and more kids stayed, especially now that they had a local college, too.

      Small changes with outsize impact. Nothing threatened the old way of life here yet, but it sure was odd to see kids wearing saggy, beltless, shapeless pants, as if the whole world wanted to see their underwear, instead of boot-cut jeans and ropers. Among the younger set, the cowboy hat had been completely replaced by the ball cap. Sometimes Gage grinned, because it was all familiar to him from the days before he moved here. It had just taken longer to arrive than he had, that was all.

      Velma buzzed him on the intercom. “Sheriff? There’s a man here looking for Micah.”

      Gage didn’t hesitate. “Send him back.”

      Maybe he remained overly cautious from his DEA days, but Gage was protective of his deputies, their addresses and their whereabouts. Velma’s description had spoken volumes. She hadn’t given the visitor a name, which meant he wasn’t local. Gage went instantly on guard.

      A half minute later, a tall dark man appeared in Gage’s doorway. Gage experienced an instant of recognition so fleeting it was gone before he could nail it down.

      “Come in,” he said to the stranger, rising to offer his hand.

      The man took it and shook firmly, giving Gage a chance to study him. His first guess was Native American, but the thick beard threw him off. Coppery skin tone, but that could be from the sun. Chambray shirt and jeans.

      “Gage Dalton,” he said. “Have we met before?”

      The man shook his head. “Major Ethan Parish.”

      At once Gage stilled. He studied the man even more closely, and now the instant of recognition made sense. “You look a bit like him. Related?”

      Ethan nodded.

      “Well, take a seat.”

      The two men sat facing each other across the expanse of the old wood desk with its stacks of papers.

      “Does Micah know you’re here?” Gage asked.

      “No.”

      “I see.” Gage drummed his fingers on the desk for just a moment. He recognized the look in Ethan Parish’s eyes. Micah still showed it on occasion, as did Billy Joe Yuma, the county’s rescue pilot. He had also seen the look on the faces of his fellow DEA agents when they’d been on the streets too long. Sometimes he saw it in his own mirror.

      “Look,” he said after a moment. “If Micah doesn’t know you’re here, I don’t feel I should be telling you how to find him. Maybe you should call him.”

      “This isn’t something I want to do on the phone.”

      “Why not?”

      Ethan Parish hesitated, looking past Gage as if debating how much to tell.

      “Tell you what,” Gage said after a few moments. “Tell me who you are. Something about yourself.”

      “Marine recon, special operations. One tour in Iraq, two in Afghanistan. Other things I can’t tell you about. I won’t be going back. Medical discharge.”

      “You were wounded?”

      “More than once.”

      Gage nodded. “I’m sorry.”

      Ethan Parish merely looked at him. “I’m better off than many.”

      Gage nodded again. “Still walking.”

      Ethan nodded once. “And talking. Anyway, I’ll be officially discharged within the next six months.”

      “Need a job?”

      “If I stay here.”

      Gage rubbed his chin and settled back in his chair. “How’s Micah fit in the picture?”

      Ethan’s mouth tightened.

      “Look, you know about protecting your men. I’m no different.”

      That seemed to cause a shift in the man facing him. At last Ethan relaxed a hair. “This can’t get out.”

      “Believe me, I know how to keep a secret. I was undercover DEA before I came here.”

      That did the trick. “Micah Parish doesn’t know it, but he’s my father.”

      Gage froze. “Oh, hell,” he said finally. “This could raise a real storm.”

      “That’s why I don’t want it getting out until I talk to him.”

      “I can sure understand that.” Gage paused to think again. “Okay,” he said finally. “Tell you what I’ll do. Micah’s on his day off, so I’ll drive you out to his ranch. But you better not tell his wife who you are before you get a chance to talk to him in private.”

      “That’s how I was hoping to handle it.”

      “Then we see eye-to-eye. Come on, let’s go. You can think up a cover story while we drive.”

      That afternoon, Connie’s world blew up. It happened the way such things do, utterly without warning, and in an instant that was otherwise utterly benign.

      On her day off, she always had plenty to do. Her mother, disabled by a severe fall several years ago, helped as much as she could, but being stuck in a wheelchair severely limited her activities. In many ways she created extra work for Connie, but it was work she didn’t mind, because she didn’t know how she would have been able to hold a job and care for Sophie properly at the same time without her mother there.

      Sophie had reached the amazing age of seven, when girls start to act like little mothers, developing a streak of independence and becoming downright bossy. So far, Sophie’s imitation of motherhood had proved more amusing than anything else, although Connie suspected that at some point they would need to have a discussion before the girl alienated all her friends by bossing them around.

      “Perfectly normal,” Connie’s mother said. “All girls do it. It’d be worse if she had a brother.”

      “I