North and Shaw Out of Office - Gregory Ashe Page 0,14
you point out where you saw that woman?”
“What? Oh, we’ve talked about spanking, we’ve talked about—phew.” Instead of delivering a spanking, Jane picked up the tiny girl and spun her, laughing as she did. “The woman? That’s what you were asking about? I saw her just up there by the treeline.”
“Thanks,” North said. “Come on, toothpick.”
As they left behind the laughing, screaming children, Shaw said, “You’re sure you don’t want to join up with the gals? I bet you know how to make a mean mojito.”
“And visit a pony farm? No thanks. I’m allergic.”
“You just seemed so excited when they offered.”
“I was more excited when I found out your fantasies about me included a sling and creative use of your tongue. Maybe you can give Tuck some ideas. Lord knows the man hasn’t tried anything new since 2013. Now hurry up. I want to find those damn goats before I have to talk to one more horrifying excuse for a human being.”
“Kids,” Shaw said. “You probably forgot, but remember: they’re called kids.”
North came after him, charging, and Shaw tried to dodge. He really did. But he ended up on the ground, his shirt stuffed full of clover and a wicked indian burn on his forearm, while North whistled and strolled away.
5
THEY DIDN’T FIND any tracks behind the barn, although Shaw insisted he saw something—a slightly flattened area near the rear doors. North didn’t see anything, and he thought Shaw was only saying that because of the indian burn. At the treeline, though, they found a break in the old oaks where a dirt road was slowly being reclaimed by bluegrass and honeysuckle. Here, the signs of a vehicle were obvious: broken branches, trampled weeds, and one perfectly clear tire track in the ruts that marked where the truck—North was almost certain it was a truck—had stopped.
Shaw asked, “Do we follow it?”
“I don’t know. Do we?”
“It’s my vacation. I want to find those kids.”
“Then you shouldn’t have worn straw shoes.”
Shaw lifted his foot. “They’re not straw, they’re a native grass that grows—”
Launching forward, North tried to swallow the groan that was building in his chest.
“Your stomach is rumbling,” Shaw called after him. “I think I packed you a tofu bar.”
North walked faster.
They walked for at least a half an hour, and as they did, the world came alive around them: bumblebees bobbing above white-and-gold blossoms, birds singing on the shadowed branches, a vole darting out across the path and disappearing into the brush on the other side moments before a fox shot after it in pursuit.
North caught Shaw’s arm when he took off after the fox.
“It’s going to kill that vole.”
“You are allowed to save one baby animal per day. Max.”
“I really think I should—”
“One. You picked the goats.”
“Kids.”
They walked another hundred yards before Shaw said, “What do you think this is?”
“That, Shaw, is called a tree. They grow roots deep underground, and—”
“No, this road or whatever it used to be.”
“I think it’s a road.”
Shaw dead-armed him.
“Ouch, Jesus. Ok.”
“You’re supposed to be limping, too.”
“Oh, right. I forgot.”
“So?”
North shrugged. “This part looks like it’s been harvested a few times. So maybe it was a tree farm—maybe it still is a tree farm—and this was an access road. Or maybe it’s something else—a fire break, whatever the hell those are. Or maybe it’s an old smuggler road?”
Shaw considered the road again. “I was thinking about how alcohol is a poison and we’re both really trying to detox our bodies, and I—”
“Are you ok?”
Shaw faced forward, and his hands came up, loosening the bun of chestnut hair, combing his fingers through sweaty strands.
“I haven’t asked you that yet,” North said. “Not really. Does that make me a shitty friend?”
“No, it doesn’t. And I’m fine.” Shaw must have caught North’s expression out of the corner of his eye because he smiled, and he let his hair cascade, spilling between his shoulder blades in loose curls. “I am. Honestly.”
“You’re not sleeping.”
“I’m still processing it. A lot of it. All of it, I guess.”
The words almost spilled out: I want you to be done processing it, I want you never to have to process anything again. But North had known Shaw long enough to know when it was better not to tell Shaw that he was just wading deeper into his own bullshit. If it helped him—and Christ, please, let it help him—then North wasn’t going to put up a stink. Not yet, anyway.
“If you scream tonight,” North said, “I’m going to shove a pillow in your