Blood Trail - By Tanya Huff Page 0,41

Various rustlings in the underbrush seemed to indicate that the locals found the whole thing pretty funny.

She glared at a pale green moss growing all around a tree.

"Where the hell are the Boy Scouts when you need one?"
Chapter Six
Vicki saw no apparent thinning of the woods; one moment she was in them, the next she was stepping out into a field. It wasn't a field she recognized either. There were no sheep, no fences, and no indication of where she might be.

Settling her bag more firmly on her shoulder, she started toward the white frame house and cluster of outbuildings that the other end of the field rolled up against. Maybe she could get directions, or use their phone...

"... or get run off for trespassing by a large dog and a farmer with a pitchfork." She was pretty sure they did that sort of thing in the country, that it was effectively legal, and that it didn't matter because she wasn't going back into those woods. She'd take on half a dozen farmers with pitchforks first.

As she approached, wading knee-deep through grass and goldenrod and thistles, she became convinced that no one had worked this farm for quite some time. The barn had a faded, unused look about it and she could actually smell the roses that climbed all over one wall of the white frame house.

The field ended in a large vegetable garden. Vicki recognized the cabbages, the tomato plants, and the raspberry bushes - nothing else seemed familiar. Which isn't really surprising. She picked her way around the perimeter. My vegetables usually come with a picture of the jolly green...

"Oh. Hello."

"Hello." The elderly man, who had appeared so suddenly in her path, continued to stare, obviously waiting for her to elaborate further.

"I, uh, got lost in the woods."

His gaze started at her sneakers, ran up her scratched and bitten legs, past her walking shorts, paused for a moment on her Blue Jays' T-shirt, flicked over to her shoulder bag, and finally came to rest on her face. "Oh," he said, a small smile lifting the edges of his precise gray mustache.

The single word covered a lot of ground, and the conclusion it drew would've annoyed the hell out of Vicki if it hadn't been so accurate. She held out her hand. "Vicki Nelson."

"Carl Biehn."

His palm was dry and leathery, his grip firm. Over the years, Vicki had discovered she could tell a lot about a man based on how he shook hands with her - or if he'd shake hands at all. Some men still seemed absolutely confused about what to do when the offered hand belonged to a woman. Carl Biehn shook hands with an economy of movement that said he had nothing to prove. She liked him for it.

"You look like you could use some water, Ms. Nelson."

"I could use a lake," Vicki admitted, rubbing at the sweat collected under her chin.

His smile broadened. "Well, no lake, but I'll see what I can do." He led the way around the raspberry bushes and Vicki fell into step beside him. Her first view of the rest of the garden brought an involuntary exclamation of delight.

"Do you like it?" He sounded almost shy.

"It's... " She discarded a pile of adjectives as inadequate and finished simply. "... the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

"Thank you." He beamed; first at her and then out over the flower beds where a fallen rainbow, shattered into a thousand brilliant pieces, perched against every possible shade of green. "The Lord has been good to me this summer."

Vicki tensed, but he made no other reference to God. And thank God for that. She had no idea if her admiration had broken through the elderly man's reserve or if he simply had none when it came to the garden. As they walked between the beds, he introduced the flowers they passed as though they were old friends - here adjusting a stake that held a blood red gladioli upright, there swiftly beheading a dying blossom.

"... dusty orange beauties are dwarf hemerocallis, day lilies. If you make the effort to plant early, middle, and late varieties, they'll bloom beautifully from June on into September. They're not a fussy grower, not hard to work with, just give them a little phosphate and potash and they'll show their appreciation. Now these shasta daisies over here... "

Having spent most of her life in apartments, Vicki understood next to nothing about gardens or the plants that grew in them but