Page 161 of South of Nowhere

Or she might have meant that she was going to help him hang the items in one of the spacious closets in her bedroom, slipping both the running and dress shoes under the bed.

Not much doubt about which.

“No worries,” he said lightly.

“But, Colter, really, I hope we can all get together at some point. That’d be real nice.”

“It would be,” Shaw said. “Take care now.”

“You too. And really, I mean it. Thanks.”

“ ’Night.”

He hit disconnect, knowing without a vapor of doubt that those would be the last words the two would ever share.

A moment later the Public Safety pickup arrived, and Debi Starr got out.

She shook Shaw’s hand warmly.

“Like your ticket?”

“Funny.”

“We’ll have statements for you and your sister to read and sign. Your mother too. She is one heck of a shot. Was she ever in combat?”

Being the wife and partner of Ashton Shaw meant that, in a way,yes. She’d been instrumental in dealing with threats to her husband and the family at the Compound. And she’d done this efficiently and without emotion. But he shook his head no. “She hunts a lot.”

“Well, whole ’nother matter: I want to say something. Han said that you talked to him about me being the chief of police and all. Darn if that wasn’t nice of you.”

“You’re a natural at this business.” Shaw said nothing more. He was not good with gratitude.

“Ah, thank you for that too. But I wanted to tell you, I’m passing.”

Shaw was nodding slowly. “You’re…”

“Not taking the job.”

“But, look, traffic detail in a small town—”

“No, no, no. I guess I never explained. Jim and me’re moving now that the twins’re out of school. We’re going to San Francisco.” She tapped the Hinowah Public Safety patch on her biceps. “I just took this job temporary. I passed the civil service tests at San Francisco PD and I’m going to be fast-tracked for detective.”

Shaw could only laugh. “You’ll be an even better gold shield than a small-town police chief.”

“Here’s hoping.”

“And Tolifson?”

She gave a wry look. “He’s entertaining candidates and took himself off the list for chief.”

“All right,DetectiveStarr…Get us those reports, and we’ll sign ’em and send ’em back.”

He extended his hand, but she stepped in and hugged him hard.

After she’d left, he put a square of Gorilla Tape over the bullet hole in hopes that it would contain the cracks—this rarely worked, but he was less likely to get a real ticket if the officer saw he was making an effort.

He couldn’t take the camper through town—the valley roads were too narrow and the crest onto the south side of Route 13 would never work, so he made a three-point turn and drove ten miles in aloop around Hinowah, past the defunct fracking operation and then east again.

Picking up on 13, he continued for about a mile through the misty night until he could see the garish red and yellow lights of the motel’s neon sign in duplicate: above the structure itself and, distorted, on the wet asphalt before him.

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