Chapter 11

"Howard, maybe I need to go stay with Aunt Jean. It would take a little pressure off both of us."

"Baby, oh my beautiful Baby, don't think that. I just need to know that I can hold you and I'm okay. I've been thinking about this all week and I didn't know what else to do. Pete told me what happened to those people in the pasture when your cell phone was used to call in the report about the buzzards. It was all I could think about when Santos said if he ever got the chance he'd leave you in the pasture."

"He said what?" Gail wasn't exactly screaming, but very nearly so.

Carefully, Howard repeated the threat the man had made, watching to see if Gail understood. "Santos said something like, 'Usted controla a su mujer.' That basically means, 'You control your woman.' Then he said, 'I'll leave her out in the pasture with nothing but cows to lick her breasts.'"

Gail struggled against Howard, but he would not release her, "Oh My God. Oh My God. Oh My God. What have I ever done to that man to make him hate me so?"

"It's not you he wants, it's me. It's not me he wants. It's that house. It's not just the house. It's the whole ranch. He wants to own the land from the river to the highway. He doesn't dare do anything to me personally, he knows I've reported him and he knows the sheriff and the feds will never leave him alone if something happens to me. He's cautious about you, but he could do something stupid."

Howard continued to talk, trying to calm Gail, " He doesn't know what I'd do to him if he so much as touches you again. If he can scare me off, he will take the ranch and the house and frighten Frank into doing nothing. Frank is my brother, but he's not much more than a loud mouth. He wouldn't lift a finger to try to run Santos off. I am the only thing Santos doesn't own or control between the border and the highway. And I'm not leaving.

"Santos has a huge ranch in Mexico. It's his wife's property. The only reason he is here is because of the money he makes from his people express, and I'm doing everything I can to stop it. It pisses him off that a little nobody like me, a gnat, is in his way and he can't swat me like he wants to."

Finally able to understand the kind of pressure Howard has been under, Gail shook her head as she said, "This is insanity, pure insanity."

"No, Baby, this is life. It is your life and my life. Santos knows me and he knows what I can do. I've done it before. I may not look like I can do much more than work in a hardware store or watch a bunch of cows eating grass. But I can. I can do a lot more, and he knows it."

"What do you mean?" When Howard did not answer her, Gail stood, and stepped away from him. For the moment, he let her go. She took another step back when she saw the look on his face. Howard did nothing. Instead he just stood and looked at her, so she asked again, "What do you mean, Howard?"

"Gail, I am not a gnat, but no one knows it. Not even Frank. I don't tell my brother very much. He can't keep his mouth shut. You know that scarf Santos wears like a necktie? He used to wear a stickpin in the tie. It was a daisy, an insignificant little flower, maybe twenty slender petals and a big yellow center. The Spanish call them a margarita. Yeah, it's the same word they use for the tequila drink.

"Santos's daisy was small, about the size of the first joint of your little finger. It had long slender white enamel petals and a yellow diamond in the center. He stopped one day, like I was telling you, just to say something, just to piss me off, offered me a woman, complained a little saying a couple of my cows broke down a fence, talked a little trash about me owing him something to repair the fence. I reached in and pulled the stickpin out of his tie and I was looking at it. He got all huffy, demanded I give it back. It was a gift from his wife; she had it made for him; some expensive jeweler in Mexico, and so forth. I just looked at him and said something like, "Yeah, I'll give it back, when I'm ready." He stomped on the gas, twisted the steering wheel and man, if I hadn't jumped back, the rear end of his big black car would have knocked me down."

"Well, did you give it back?"

As if he did not hear Gail's question, Howard continued. "He's got all kinds of men around his house. It's like an armed compound. It doesn't look like it, but there are men sitting in a chair on a platform in a tree, full time, around the clock, a weapon hidden somewhere on them—and probably more nearby, guarding his lousy rear. A couple of nights after he made the threat against you, I left his stickpin in his pillow, right beside his head."

Gail was almost hyperventilating, she couldn't catch her breath, "Howard, oh please, please don't tell me any more, I don't want to know. I don't want to know any more."

He stepped forward and gathered her back into his arms. "It's okay, Baby, I promise you, it's okay. He is not going to hurt you. He knows I can get to him anytime I want. I'm good. I've been one of the best. But the first time someone like me feels himself hesitate, you have to stop or a lot of people will get hurt. I hesitated once. So I stopped. I quit.

"Santos tried to find out about me. I don't know what he knows—maybe nothing, or not much, but he knows something. My military records are supposed to be sealed, but there are still ways for some people to find out about me. That's enough to keep him away, away from me and away from you. But it's not enough to stop him, and that's what I want."

"Howard, I can't do this. I cannot do this."

"Gail, I want you, and what's more important, I need you. I'm not very good at talking about my feelings, but you are important to me, like nothing I have ever imagined. I don't know if that's love. I don't know if it's just lust. I just know it is. I'm not sure about you, but I sense you feel the same about me, don't you?" When she didn't answer or nod her head, he asked again, "Don't you?"

Finally, she said, so faintly he barely heard her, "Yes."

Howard tightened his arms around her and said, "That's all I need to know."

"Gail," Atwood interrupted her as she carried a stack of files from the workroom to her new desk. He followed her through the newly completed doorway that connected his old offices with the new office space.

"Yes, sir?"

"You know, you have created a mystery that I am compelled to solve. I'm too old for this. I wish I were fifty-two instead of seventy-two. Well, hell as long as I'm wishing, I'm gonna wish for thirty-two. I can't ask for anything younger or I wouldn't have Olivia. I've been moving boxes in my garage all weekend." He held up his hands for a moment. "Don't get excited. I didn't actually move most of them. I called Barry, our runner, and promised him double pay for working the weekend, and he helped me. So I have a load of files for you. They're in the trunk of my car. When Barry gets here this afternoon, he's going to unload my car and we are going on a treasure hunt."

"What is the treasure we're going to look for?"

"Well-l-l," Atwood drawled out the word, increasing Gail's curiosity. "I've been doing this for more than forty years and my dad did the same for about fifty years. Of course, some of those years overlap, but his father was a lawyer, too. He called himself a solicitor, which isn't really proper, but I think I'd like being called a solicitor. It sounds so much better than being called a lawyer, maybe even a little saucy." He wiggled his eyebrows and then chuckled because his remark caused Gail to blush.

"I'm sorry. Olivia tells me I should only say such things to her. She is a cute little thing, isn't she? You should have seen her when she was eighteen. One look, that's all it took."

Atwood cleared his throat and returned to his explanation. "Anyway, I have three or four boxes of my grandfather's papers. They are in a jumble. I suppose they didn't produce as much paper as we do now. In fact I know they didn't, they just rolled them up or stacked one on top of another.

"I wonder sometimes, will we ever really get to the point of a paperless society? No, probably not. The lawyers wouldn't have anything to do.

"My apologies, madam, I will return to the subject at hand. So, I have roughly about one hundred years of history."

Gail was aware Atwood did not mention his son, Michael, who had shared the Law Office space with his father before his untimely death. He'd had an undetected defect in his heart and failed to awaken one morning. He had practiced law for only ten years. For the short time she had known Atwood, Gail could not recall him mentioning his son's name, although he often mentioned Clarissa, his daughter-in-law. Gail had asked Petra, who quietly told her a little about Michael Atwood.

"Are you going to give all of your old papers to a museum or something like that?"

"That is what I have been discussing with my very learned friend Philip, ah, that's Philip Querax, damn, pardon me, why are some of these Latino names so difficult? Querexeta, yes Philip Querexeta, is an historian as an avocation, a very good one. At least HE SAYS he is good. He specializes in documents. He's been harassing me for a number of years. I will not tell you how many years. He wants the boxes at the bottom of my stash."

"Is that a Mexican name, or might it be Basque?"

"Uh oh, the lady knows something I don't. As a matter of fact, Philip says he is Basque and dislikes being referred to as Hispanic or Latino. I don't think Fisher is a derivative, but is Pleas a Basque name?"

"Howard says he is Basque and the family name is like seven or eight syllables long, and starts with Magoo, or something like that. I've been online searching for something that fits, without much luck." Gail told Atwood as much as she knew and he said they would just wait until Philip came in after lunch with his supplies. Atwood shook his head about historians and their proclivities to preserve, preserve, preserve. Evidently Philip knew quite a lot about how to handle old documents, including ridiculous white cotton gloves, how to put a document into protective archival covering so it can still be studied, and had volunteered to give Atwood and Gail a quick lesson. After their instruction, he would "permit" them to help him examine Atwood's collection.

"Atwood, isn't this going to take a lot of time? We have other work to do. I think at least one buyer is coming in this afternoon to sign."

"Yes, yes, my dear, and with our receptionist back, Petra has more time. You can do the closing and Philip and I will do research, but you can help as much as you have time to spare. It will all work out."

As Atwood walked away, he stopped and turned back to Gail. "By the way, did you have your little discussion with Howard?"

"Yes and he won't budge. He said if I find another place to live, he will sleep on the porch until the neighbors embarrass me into letting him out of the doghouse and back inside."

Atwood grinned, saluted her, and walked away, quietly singing, Mendelssohn's Wedding March, "Here comes the bride. Here comes the bride."

Gail called out to him, in a sing-song voice, "You're not helping."

Atwood just laughed and went back into his office while Gail continued moving into her office. By lunch time, all she wanted to do was sit down and drink something cold. Howard walked in and handed her a bag from a nearby hamburger place and plopped himself down in one of the other chairs around the small table in the coffee break room.

"There's one in there for me, it has jalapeño peppers on it. I called a little while ago. Petra said you were on the phone. I told her not to let you leave for lunch."

"Are you still following me, watching over me?"

"No, I just wanted to see my girl for lunch." He grinned and laughed when she blushed. "You are so cute when you blush. I don't always embarrass you on purpose, but I like to watch those cheeks turn pink. I wonder if you blush all over, hum, I'm going to need to investigate this."

"Howard, be nice."

"Me" he slapped both hands to his chest, "I'm not being nice? Why, Sweetheart, I'm one of the nicest men you know."

"Yes, I would have to agree with you about that."

Atwood walked in and lightly pounded Howard on the shoulder, "What you got in there for me?"

Howard answered, "Meat, bread, mustard and onions. Atwood that is not a hamburger, a good hamburger is juicy, runs down your arm, and then drips off your elbow."