Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
T wo guys as big as the driver had been waiting when the SUV pulled around behind a country-style bar. They’d taken him by either arm and escorted him into the building by way of a back door, through a kitchen. Portholes in swinging doors provided a glimpse of the hardwood floors and bar top on the other side. Then they took him through another door off the side, into a small room with dark-blue paint, a wooden chair, and a single, small window set deep into the wall. Its windowsill was two feet deep, and it had bars on the inside edge.
The big dudes deposited him in a wooden chair, the only piece of furniture in the room. Then they left him alone and closed the door. Locks turned. He got out of the chair, walked around, tried the doorknob for the hell of it.
Someone thumped the door’s other side and said, “Knock it off.”
He went to the window, could reach through the bars far enough to touch the glass. But the window didn’t have any opening mechanism that he could see, short of smashing through it. Which would do him no good anyway, due to the bars.
The door opened, and he turned. A barrel-chested man with Colonel Sanders hair, and the bolo tie to go with it came inside and closed the door behind him.
“So, you’re the genius behind that little solar tile, are you? Smart fella. Smart.”
“If I’m so smart, how’d I wind up here?” Harrison asked, looking around the room. Was there anything he could use for a weapon? Could he bring himself to bash an old man’s head in, even if there were?
Was Maria okay? He thought she’d been okay. He flashed back to his last sight of her, lying on the ground, reaching for him, tears in her eyes. She’d better be okay.
“Winding up here might not be such a bad thing, son.” The older man’s use of the word son made Harrison’s skin crawl. “I’m Jimbo Beckett.”
“Charmed, I’m sure.” His sarcasm went right over the old man’s head, and he went on as if Harrison hadn’t spoken.
“I’ve been fighting this battle for the better part of five years, now.”
“Attacking windmills.”
“Among other things.” He sounded defensive.
Harrison told himself not to antagonize the guy. The only weapon he had here was his mind. He had to outsmart him, outthink him. Insulting him would not further that goal. Carrie had said he needed to give the crazy billionaire a reason to keep him alive. But her way wouldn’t fool the man for long.
“You can’t stop progress, though,” Harrison said. “There are hundreds of scientists working on renewables. There are five teams right behind mine, working on the same technology. You stopping my team only delayed the inevitable by a few months. It’s the way of the future. And it’s a good way. Try to imagine it— limitless clean energy that doesn’t destroy the environment.”
“Limitless energy means I go broke. My wells shut down; my refineries sit idle. My businesses employ upwards of ten-thousand good people, young fella. What are they supposed to do?”
“There will be plenty of jobs in clean energy. They won’t go away; they’ll just shift from fossil fuels to renewables.
“Bah—”
“Sir, the warming alone is?—”
“Lies. All lies.”
Harrison lowered his head, realizing the notion of saving mankind wasn’t going to be an effective approach with the oil baron.
“Carrie works for me,” Beckett said. “She tell you that?”
“She mentioned it, yes.”
“She says the job is too much for one person.”
“What job is that?” He made himself sound interested.
“Keeping abreast of what’s coming down the pipeline so I can try to steer it another way.”
“Sabotage it, you mean,” Harrison said.
Beckett shrugged. “Whatever it takes. But again, she says it’s too big a job for one person.”
“It’s too big a job for one hundred people. The tech is coming like a hurricane over a freakishly hot ocean.”
The older man waved his hands. “I told her you wouldn’t listen. But she made me promise to try.” Then he opened the door, and said, “Thing One, git in here. Bring your sidearm and a roll of that plastic from the storeroom.”
A bolt of sheer self-preservation shot up Harrison’s spine and emerged from his lips unplanned. “What you really need is a way to make fossil fuels harmless.”
One of the big guys was right outside the door with a gun in his hand. It had a silencer on the end, like in the movies. Every part of Harrison’s body went cold. He thought how devastated his father would be if he died. And Lily. He thought of Maria, and that he hadn’t even said the words he’d been stubbornly refusing to let himself say, or even think.
Beckett held up a hand to stop the guy with the gun then closed the door and turned.
“Say more.”
He couldn’t say more, there was no such thing, and there wasn’t enough crude oil in the ground to last much longer anyway.
Sure, but he doesn’t know that. And if you told him that, he wouldn’t believe you.
That had been his mother’s voice whispering through his mind. For the first time, he wondered if it might be more than just his brain creating it based on memories and data.
“It’s… just something I’ve been working on,” he said, making it up as he went along. “The notion is, instead of replacing fossil fuels, we… take out the harmful parts.”
The man’s face changed. He looked the way he’d look if he’d been dying of thirst, and Harrison had handed him a glass of ice water. All the tension left, his brows rose and he said, “That makes a lot of sense.”
It made no sense whatsoever. “I’m thinking the oil company with the patent on this would be way ahead of the game. Not just ahead of renewables, but ahead of all the other oil companies.”
Beckett stared at him. Harrison held his gaze without blinking. He imagined Maria’s uncles, staring down a black-hat in an old-west-style gunfight. He squared his shoulders, even pushed out his chest and lifted his chin. He would not blink or avert his eyes, because that was an honest cowboy thing. Right?
Abruptly, Beckett pivoted and left him, slamming the door behind him. Harrison got up, stretched his arms and walked around. It was working. So far, so good.
He paced, turned and paced back by the window, looked out and saw Maria’s face, between her cupped hands, looking in at him.
He almost shouted her name and clapped a hand over his own mouth.
The door opened, and he jumped out of his skin, turning fully before he landed. Then he moved opposite the window, and Beckett, facing him, said, “You nervous about somethin’?”
“Yeah, I’m nervous. Shoot me.” Had he really just said “shoot me” to a killer with a gun?
Beckett released a bark of laughter, though. “You’re funny, I’ll give you that.”
“Can you really get Carrie’s husband into that clinical trial, Mr. Beckett?” he asked to change the subject from taking lives to maybe saving one.
“I’ve done it before. No reason to think I can’t do it again. Offer to fully fund somebody’s next project, and they’ll bend a few rules for you.” He leaned out the door. “Carrie, git in here.” And when she came in, he said to Harrison, “Tell your idea again, so she can hear.”
Meeting her eyes, he repeated the ridiculous idea he had just presented to Beckett. Beckett was watching her face intently. It was creepy.
She listened, but he could tell she was also aware of Beckett’s perusal. And it made her nervous. “I’d have to see your methods, Harrison, but… yes.” She returned her gaze to Beckett’s. “It could work.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?” Beckett asked.
“She didn’t know,” Harrison said before Carrie could have answered. “I’ve been keeping the notion to myself. You know, as soon as a new idea gets out, thirty people start working on the same thing, so…”
“Huh.” Beckett looked at Harrison and then at Carrie. Then he said, “Still don’t see why I need both of you.”
“Sir,” Harrison said. “It really does take a whole team to?—”
Beckett left the room, closed the door. Harrison didn’t hear the locks turn this time. Carrie glared at him. “Great! Just great! Now he’ll kill me and keep you!”
“No. Listen, if you can get outside, you can get away.” He wasn’t going to tell her his Maria was out there. He didn’t trust Carrie not to betray him to Beckett to stay in his favor.
“What do you mean?” Carrie asked.
“Are they keeping you prisoner?”
She looked at the door. “He didn’t lock the door, so no. Not yet.”
“Can you walk outside freely? Make up an excuse to go get something out of the car or…?”
“Yeah. I can do that.”
“When you get out, run toward the road out front,” he said. “If you stay toward the east there are boulders you can use for cover. And keep your hands in sight.”
She frowned at him, turned to the door, then turned back again. She pulled something from her jeans pocket. A key. “The prototype from the university is in a safe deposit box in El Paso. I don’t know what Beckett did with the one from your car. I’m sorry.”
Then she opened the door and stepped out into the kitchen. The big guy guarding the door said, “Boss said he’d be right back.”
“I know. He told me to get that box out of the car by the time he gets here. I’d better hurry, he’s not in a good mood.” She headed for the back exit. The guard didn’t try to stop her. He closed, but once again did not lock, Harrison’s door. Harrison prayed Carrie would get out.
Less than a minute ticked by before Beckett was coming in again, a bottle and three glasses in his hands. “Now, let’s talk this through,” he began, but then he looked around the room in alarm. “Where is she?”
Harrison shrugged.
Beckett turned to the guard. “Where is my scientist?”
“Went to get something out of the SUV, sir.”
Beckett smacked the guy upside the head with an open hand. “Idjit! Get out after her and don’t bring her back.”
“Sir!” The guard hurried out the rear exit, and Beckett went in the other direction, out of the kitchen and into the front part of the saloon, roaring for his men and leaving Harrison’s door wide open.
“Hey, wait!” Harrison followed Beckett into the barroom. The open bottle was on the hardwood, the glasses lying on their sides around it. An extinguished half-cigar rested in a glass ashtray the same color as the booze.
“Mr. Beckett,” Harrison said, “I need Carrie, I can’t do it alone!”
“Carrie sealed her fate when she sneaked outta here.” Beckett went to a window, parted a curtain, and looked out. Harrison walked a few steps nearer, as careful as if he were approaching a coiled cobra, until he could see the three big guys walking around the parking lot in search of Carrie.
He willed her to hide someplace they’d never find her and prayed Maria was safe out of their sight. And then, right in front of his eyes, a lasso sailed out of the air and looped around one of the men. It fell to his legs then yanked itself tight. The guy’s feet were pulled right out from under him, and he was dragged across the road and into the desert by a distant rider.
“Hell and damnation, the Brands are here!” Beckett said.
He pulled out his phone, and Harrison realized he would call for more men. More killers. And Maria was out there. He couldn’t let him! He grabbed the bourbon bottle off the bar and smashed Jimbo Beckett over the head with it. The phone flew right out of the old man’s hand, arching through the air and landing in the filled sink.
“Son of a—” Beckett, clutching the back of his bleeding head with one hand, pulled a gun with the other, and Harrison dove over the bar, crashing down behind it.
The gun went off, and off, and off, smashing bottles in the rack behind the bar. Booze and glass rained down on Harrison as he crab walked behind the bar from one end to the other, and then he switched direction and crept back to the beginning. He peeked out around the bar. Beckett was reloading while moving toward the other end. His back was to the exit. Harrison could make it out. Maybe.
He took a breath then lunged out from behind the bar, across the floor toward the exit. It was farther than he thought.
“Why you sneaky, son-of-a-varmint?—”
Gunshots followed Harrison out the door. He ran for all he was worth, looking over his shoulder, turning fully when Beckett exploded out of the saloon, raising his gun. Harrison raised his arms defensively and closed his eyes, expecting to be shot. Then there was shouting and footsteps and shotguns cocking.
He opened his eyes. Beckett raised his hands and tossed his weapon to the ground. Harrison looked behind him to see a solid wall of armed Brands, bearing various sorts of weapons, every one of them trained on the oil man. Maria stood front and center, Ethan on her left, and her mother, Jessi, on her right.
Maria met his eyes and smiled. “He hurt you, did he?”
“Not much.” Behind the crowd of Maria’s aunts, uncles, and cousins, Willow was putting Carrie, handcuffed, into the back of her SUV. Other police vehicles were arriving on the scene, sirens wailing. All three of Beckett’s body guards were handcuffed and sitting on the ground against a boulder.
It was over.
Harrison walked toward Maria, and she smiled, lowering her shotgun.
Someone shouted, and Harrison turned instinctively as Beckett lunged at him with a big hunting knife raised over his head, yelling, “You tricked me, you no good, lyin’ son of a?—”
Maria fired.
Beckett howled, dropping the knife, and hopping on one foot, while holding the other up. There was a hole right through his boot.
Willow pushed through her family members with a pair of handcuffs and another deputy at her side. The Brands were putting their guns away, stepping aside to let law enforcement take charge. Ignoring Beckett’s howls of pain, Willow cuffed him up. “We’ll take it from here. If everyone’s okay?”
She looked at Harrison and then at Maria just as Hyram and Lily ran to him and wrapped him and Maria in their arms.
Harrison said, “I’m okay, Willow,” over his family’s heads.
“I’m way better now,” Maria said. Then her family gathered around them both, everyone clapping shoulders, exchanging handshakes and full-on hugs that hurt like hell and felt great at the same time.
Ethan brought Harrison’s hat over and put it on his head. “You dropped it out by Lone Wolf Rock,” he said.
“Thanks, Ethan.”
“You’re welcome, Harrison.”
After happy reunions and a huge family dinner, Maria and Harry sat on the front porch of the Texas Brand. It was late, full on dark and the bugs were singing up a storm. Everyone had gone to bed happy and relieved. She and Harry had taken a bottle of wine in an ice bucket and two glasses onto the porch with them.
She said, “I’m fixin’ to talk to the real estate people tomorrow. See if they’ll let me rent my place on Bluebonnet Lane while the mortgage processes through.”
“I can help you move,” he said. “Looks like I’ll be here for at least a few days while all the legalities shake out.”
“I’m glad.” She didn’t tell him her heart was breaking at the notion of it only being a few more days before he left her. She was determined to make the best of the time they had.
“Me, too,” he said. “It’ll be nice to see the place without all the drama.”
“Well, it’s usually pretty quiet. And hot. And dry.”
“And beautiful in its own rugged way,” he said.
She didn’t want him to acknowledge her hometown’s beauty. She wanted him to make it his own. His phone beeped, he glanced at it then his eyes lit. “Willow found the solar tile right where Carrie said it would be.” He rose to his feet, scooped her up off hers, and spun her in a circle.
“Oh, Harry, that’s wonderful!”
He set her on her feet. Then he opened the wine and poured. “Ethan’s been sending stuff to my phone the whole time I’ve been down here,” he said. “An article saying hot, dry climates are best for old men with respiratory issues. Another article about Texas Polytechnic being one of the world’s top research facilities in the field of renewable energy. Stuff about the local nurse shortage. A link to apply for openings at the local clinic, and the hospital in El Paso, I presume for my sister. And MLS listings for houses.”
“Also for your sister?”
“Yeah.” He handed her a glass. “It’s probably not cold yet, but still.”
“I’m sorry Bubba’s so— Ethan’s so pushy. He doesn’t get it.”
“He totally gets it. He’s hitting every reason I said I couldn’t stay.”
“Those aren’t the reasons, Harrison. We both know that.”
Surprise crossed his face when she used his full name. “We do?” he asked.
She nodded, holding his blue eyes with hers. “Your mom’s the reason.”
“My mom?”
“All your memories of her were in Ithaca. Your childhood was there. She’s buried there.”
He nodded and seemed to be taking in what she said.
“There’s gon’ be a big family barbecue Saturday. Gotta use up the rest of the food we bought for the weddin’ reception. We can probably even eat the cake,” she said, with a wiggle of her eyebrows. “But in the meantime, I think long showers, and comfort food, lots of sleep, and no pressure about anything. We can stay over at Bluebonnet Lane, just the two of us. Watch TV on the sofa and have a few of the most borin’, ordinary days ever.”
“Boring days sound good,” he said, sliding his arms around her from behind and nuzzling her neck. “But let’s not shoot for boring nights.”
“Well, obviously.”
She turned in his arms and lifted her head.
He pushed a hand through her hair, and said, “Don’t give up on me, okay?”
And then he kissed her, and she wondered what in the all-fired heck that was supposed to mean.
“So?” Hyram said, two days later. He and Lily were sipping sweet tea with Harrison on Maria’s front porch on Bluebonnet Lane. The real estate agent had been happy to let her move in early.
The field across the way was a sea of bluebonnets, and the breeze was warm and gentle. Harrison was standing. Dad had taken the left rocking chair and Lily the right. The chairs had been Maria’s first purchase for her new home. He’d helped her pick them out.
“This is nice, Harrison,” Lily said. “I just love it here.”
“Doc says the dry heat’s the reason my cough is so much better,” Hyram said.
Their enthusiasm for the place was helping him work up to the question he needed to ask them. “So you guys… would you be willing to… live here?”
They looked at each other, his dad and sister, grinning like Cheshire cats then they looked back at him. Hyram said, “What do you want to do, son?”
“Marry her,” he said.
They both came right up out of their seats and were hugging him before he finished speaking. Then they let him go, and his dad was pulling something from under his shirt. A chain. With— oh, God— his parents’ rings on it.
Hyram unhooked the chain, removed the engagement ring, and said, “Your mom wanted you to have this when the time came, if the girl was worthy. This one sure is.”
“Thanks, Dad.” He looked at the ring and tried not to tear up at the thought of his mother’s ring on Maria’s finger. But then he looked at his sister. “But maybe Lily should have it?—”
“I get the wedding bands,” she said. “Mom and I talked about this before she… moved on.”
“If you’re sure.”
His dad refastened the chain, wedding bands still dangling, around his neck. He’d stopped wearing his wedding band because his finger had grown too thin to keep it from falling off. Harrison said, “I’ve been meaning to ask you something else, Dad.”
“Anything, son.”
“You remember that little burial ground? The family plot on the northern end of the Texas Brand.”
“I do. It reminded me of a picture your mom drew once. She said it was a place she’d seen in a dream, right after her diagnosis. No gravestones, but the benches and the plants, the trees, and the pond. Even that little stone building— match the drawing to a tee. She said she thought that’s what heaven must look like. Wait, I took a picture of that sketch.” He took out his phone. “It was years ago, I hope I can…” He trailed off, scrolling for a long moment, while Harrison and his sister exchanged curious looks. Then finally, he said, “I do still have it. Here, see for yourself.” He passed the phone.
Harrison looked at the photo of his mother’s drawing and felt his brows arch in surprise. “It’s almost identical. Even the vista.” He showed his sister.
“I never saw a spot that matched it,” his father said. “But that one sure did.”
Harrison nodded. “Ethan’s birth mother is buried there. Garrett moved her for him. Chelsea said that’s what she would’ve wanted.”
“Oh.” Lily clearly knew where the conversation was going.
He forced himself to go on. “Do you think Mom?—”
His dad interrupted. “I think your mom would want to be wherever we are,” he said. “And I think she is, regardless of where her body rests. But I wouldn’t object to moving her.”
Lily sighed audibly. “That would make me feel so much better about wanting to move down here,” she said. “And I hear the local hospitals offer nice sign-on bonuses, too.”
Harrison raised an eyebrow. “Where’d you hear that?”
“Ethan keeps texting me listings.”
“You, too, huh?” he asked, and they all laughed.
“I love it here, too, son,” his father said. “I can find a place, and?—”
“You’ll stay with me,” Harrison said. “Me and Maria.”
“Or me and myself,” Lily added, but she was smiling wide. Then she asked in her best Texas twang, “So? Harry ? When you fixin’ to ask her?”
“‘Don’t give up on me, okay?’ What the heck did he mean by that?” Maria demanded.
Willow shrugged. “It means there’s still hope, right? What else could it mean?”
They were at the Texas Brand. It was the weekend. There was a long picnic table packed full of food and the grill was still smoking.
“All week long,” she went on, “we’ve been livin’ like honeymooners out at my place. Oh gosh, I love it so much. Did I tell you?”
“Ten times,” Willow said.
“I head to the clinic in the mornin’, and I don’t know what he does all day, but he makes delicious meals every night.”
“His dad’s been helpin’ him cook,” Willow said.
“And he’s been stockin’ the pantry. It’s almost full. And it’s just… it’s just so good , Will. It’s perfect. Except that he’s leavin’.”
“He say when?”
Maria glanced across the yard at Harry. He was chatting it up with Bubba and Baxter. The guys had really bonded. “He’s doing a private demo tomorrow for several ethical companies that are truly working for the common good. This time, they’re coming to him. Uncle Garrett said they could set up the demo out in the lower meadow.”
“And?”
“And after that, I guess he can do whatever he wants. He’ll get a big fat check, and royalties, which will be split with his partners’ survivors, and probably offers from all his dream jobs at universities and research facilities and the like.”
“Sounds like his life’s right back on track, then.”
“It is.” Maria sighed, then deliberately changed topics. “What’s gon’ happen to Carrie?”
“She’ll do some time. Less than she would have, because Harrison says she saved his life, at risk of her own.”
Maria hoped Carrie’s share of income from the solar tile would be enough to get excellent care for her husband, John. The poor man.
Lily was weaving her way toward them. She was wearing a pretty sun dress and a big straw hat over her silver-blond hair, holding a longneck bottle of beer, and smiling as if it wasn’t her first.
“Do you see my father?” she asked as she got closer. “Look at him!”
Maria looked where Lily pointed, to the horseshoe pit where the uncles were taking turns. Hyram was up, and his throws were impressive.
“It’s the dry heat,” Lily said. “His cough has all but stopped since he’s been down here.”
Willow raised her eyebrows very high and looked at Maria. Maria said, “Really? Wow, Harry didn’t tell me that. Or, um, doesn’t he know?”
“Oh, he knows,” Lily said, and tapped her bottle to Maria’s pop can.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.” But she said it in that up-pitched way that meant something.
“Lily?”
“Oh, your aunt Chelsea needs a hand. Coming, I’m coming!” she called as she ran away toward Aunt Chelsea, who had apparently turned invisible.
“Well, what in the all-fired heck was that about?” Maria asked.
Willow shrugged. “Why don’t you try to relax and enjoy yourself while they’re still here? Maybe do what Harry said, don’t give up on him. And let go of that need of yours to know exactly what happens next before it happens.
“I don’t do that.”
“You totally do that.”
“You do,” said Drew, who had sidled up beside them.
Maria frowned, reflecting. “Maybe I do. A little.”
“Let’s help clean up. It’s gettin’ dark. The boys are fixin’ to start a bonfire.”
Maria threw herself into helping out. They had it down to a science, these weekend family barbecues. Leftovers were boxed up and put away, dishes were rinsed and loaded, kitchen counters were wiped down.
The guys took care of washing down and folding up the outside tables, cleaning the grills, and starting a small fire, which was done with extreme care, due to the hot, dry conditions.
Maria was walking outside for the final stack of plates, when Harry stepped into her path. “Can I steal you for a minute?”
“From the dirty dishes? You bet you can.”
He took her hand, led her along the path that wound away from the house and yards, and into the quiet of the shrubby woods. Far behind them, too far for sparks to reach, the little fire leapt and danced. And then there was music, far nearer.
Maria jumped, startled to hear Bubba— Ethan, she mentally corrected— strumming his guitar, a few yards behind them on the path.
“Well, what do you suppose he’s up to?”
She turned toward Harry again.
“Everything’s going to change for me tomorrow,” he said. “But there are some things I don’t want to change. So, I thought I’d nail them down now, tonight, you know. Just in case.”
She tipped her head to one side. “What are you talkin’ about, Harr-ison?”
He smiled. “You were right. I didn’t want to leave Ithaca because of my mom, my memories of her. But the funny thing is, she’s been with me ever since I came here. She likes it here.”
“Yeah,” she said. “I think she even whispered into my ear once or twice.”
“I don’t even doubt it,” he said. “And the fact is, I can work anywhere. After tomorrow, I could probably even start my own lab. And Dad’s breathing is better here, and Lily… I don’t think I could get Lily to go north again if I tried. Look at her.”
Lily was standing a few yards away, feeding a raw carrot to a mare called Ginger.
“So, what are you saying?” Maria asked, looking at Harry again.
“That I’m in love with you. Have been from— I don’t know, maybe from the minute you plowed into me on that trail. And I know you just ran away from a wedding last weekend, but I’m kind of hoping you might want to try again.”
He dropped to one knee. Female voices hummed a love song in perfect harmony, as Willow, Drew, and Lily all came walking nearer. Bubba came closer too, strumming his guitar, and in a moment, some male voices offered a harmonic baritone hum as Orrin, Trevor, and Baxter joined the chorus.
Harrison held up a ring. “This was my mom’s,” he said. And Maria’s heart swelled to bursting. “Dad and Lily approve of me giving it to you. So, what do you say, Maria Michele Brand Monroe? Will you marry me?”
“You… you mean, you want to stay here? In Texas?” she said.
“I do,” he replied. “Now you say it.”
“I do,” she said, “You’re dang straight, I do!”
He rose to his feet and kissed her, picking her up off her feet. When he set her down again, she said, “And every fall, my sweet, sweet Harrison, we’re going back to your hometown and takin’ a trail ride through the foliage.”
He kissed her again, and she tasted a tear on his lips.
Behind them, the youngest generation of Brands sent a cheer into the starry sky, and all was well on The Texas Brand.