Deadlock Read online

  Hoping to change the subject, Hutch said, “What did you think of my office building?”

  They’d driven by the Denver newspaper agency’s downtown digs on their way to the restaurant.

  Dillon made a face. “Kinda ugly.”

  Hutch couldn’t disagree. It was an eleven-story structure that looked as if it might have been made out of white Legos. On one side of the facade rose a scaffoldlike structure with green-tinted panels. It could have been stacked balconies off low-rent apartments. “It’s nice inside, though,” Hutch said.

  Dillon scrambled into a big La-Z-Boy next to the couch. He crossed his legs Indian-style and parked the bowl of popcorn in his lap. He said, “In Fiddler Falls, everything is five minutes away—walking! It took us ten minutes just to get from your work to the restaurant, then a half hour to go from there to your house. I timed it.” He tapped the big watch on his wrist.

  Hutch saw that it was his hunting watch, which he had given Dillon before heading home last year. “Hey, you still have it.”

  Dillon smiled.

  Laura said, “Tell him it’s okay to change the alarm time, or at least turn it off.”

  “It’s good luck!” Dillon said. He looked at Hutch. “Remember how it woke us up when we were hiding in the cabinet—early enough for us to get away before the bad guys woke up?”

  “Early enough? That was—what?—four in the morning?”

  “Four in the morning,” Laura confirmed, sounding exasperated. “Four o’clock, every morning, beep-beep-beep-beep-beep.”

  Hutch moved around the coffee table and sat on the couch beside Laura. He raised his eyebrows at Dillon, who simply shrugged. He asked, “So do you get up that early?”

  Dillon shook his head, an emphatic no.

  Laura touched his knee. “We went back to the mine. He found one of the arrows you lost there. He has sort of a collection of . . . mementos, I guess you’d call them.”

  The puzzlement on Hutch’s face must have showed. She gave him a half shrug and put her index finger to her mouth in a way Dillon couldn’t see.

  Hutch said, “You’re into a new school year now. How’s that going?”

  “Like nothing changes,” she said. “I’m still teaching third, fourth, and fifth grades, so only a third of the faces are new. I love it. They’re great kids.”

  Hutch said to Dillon, “Does she cut you any slack, being your teacher and all?”

  The boy made a face. “Are you kidding? The teacher’s kid can’t do anything wrong. It’s not so cool.”

  A slight lisp still clung to his Ss, and Hutch smiled at that. To Laura he said, “And you’re getting by all right, it seems.”

  She frowned, but nodded. Her eyes flicked past him to her son. She said, “We’re doing okay, aren’t we? Some days are better than others.”

  Dillon said, “We have a new constable. I don’t like him.”

  Hutch nodded. Dillon’s father had been the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s only representative in Fiddler Falls. The natural response to Dillon’s statement—“Why don’t you like him?”—was a place Hutch didn’t want to go. Most likely, the boy didn’t like him simply because he wasn’t his father. Who knew what kind of emotions would come pouring out of Dillon if he tried to explain?

  The silence stretched out until Hutch thought his uneasiness would have been obvious to a toddler.

  Dillon hopped up. “I gotta pee,” he said, running for the bathroom.

  Hutch laughed. “I remember when Logan was that age. He always waited to use the bathroom until it was an emergency.”

  “So he’ll outgrow it soon?”

  “I think they reach an age when not quite making it in time is embarrassing enough to get them moving sooner.” He shifted on the sofa to face her. He whispered, “So what’s this about Dillon collecting things? It must be a painful memory for him.”

  Laura shook her head. “Of course losing his father is painful beyond measure. But right after it happened, I started steering our conversations toward finding the silver lining, you know? Not that there ever could be anything good about Tom’s death, not in a practical sense, to a child.” She thought a moment. “Not to me either. We talked about how bad things happen to good people, but God has a way of, I don’t know, redeeming even the worst things life throws at us.”

  “‘You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good,’” Hutch quoted.

  She nodded. “That got us looking for the good things that came out of that horrible situation.”

  “Like what?”

  She slapped his knee. “Like meeting you. It may have been during the worst time of our lives, but we met you all the same. You kept Dillon safe, and in the end saved all of us.”

  Hutch shook his head. “No, it wasn’t like that.”

  “Well, think what you want. You became a good friend to Dillon. You have a lot of the same qualities Tom did. You have a strong sense of right and wrong and a burning need for justice. You’re kind and . . . are you blushing?”

  “Me? Nah, a little warm’s all. The fire’s heating up the room too much.”

  She smiled sweetly, which he was sure only made his face flush more. Oh man, he thought. I have been alone too long.

  Laura said, “Dillon lost his father but found a man who treated him like a son. That you came into his life at the same time his father left us made Dillon bond to you. It took some of the pain away. I don’t know, it’s just . . . as bad as the bad is, it doesn’t mean the good isn’t good.”

  Hutch shook his head. “And then I go and stop calling. What an idiot.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Laura said. “You invited us here. You’re staying in contact with Dillon. And whether you take credit or not, we’re alive. That’s the biggest thing we’re thankful for and what we’ve focused on since then. We survived. That’s why Dillon started his collection. Not because we lost our husband and father, but because we’re still here. It makes Tom’s sacrifice mean something. Every time Dillon and I do something that makes us feel alive—kayaking down the Fond du Lac or kissing each other good night—we honor his sacrifice, we honor him.”

  A tear broke free from one eye and streaked down her cheek. A sad smile found her lips, and she wiped her face.

  “Why are you crying?” Dillon asked, putting the brakes on his bounding entrance.

  “Just talking about Daddy, sweetheart. You know how I get.”

  He came around the coffee table and wrapped his arms around her neck. They squeezed each other for a long time.

  Hutch looked away, but couldn’t keep from turning back. He felt both awkward and privileged to witness their love for each other. He had written countless columns about people whose jobs sent them wading into the muck of human misery. Emergency room nurses and doctors, homicide detectives, social workers. Many of them developed bleak outlooks on life and lost touch with the beautiful things that made the horrific ugly in the first place: they spent so much time in the dark, they forgot about the light.

  Hutch had become one of them. His children, and Laura and Dillon’s love now, were bright flashes in the darkness he’d pulled around him by delving so deeply into Page’s world.

  Mother and son parted. Laura sniffed and brushed away more tears. She ruffled Dillon’s hair. Obviously trying for lightheartedness, she tossed some popcorn into her mouth. She grabbed another handful and stood. “I think I’ll go freshen up a bit,” she said.

  She started around the couch, but was stopped by a pile of unopened boxes. “You moved in how long ago?”

  “Six months.” Hutch eyed the boxes as if they were tattling on him. “Stuff I don’t need, I guess.”

  Laura backed up and crossed between the coffee table and the TV. She said, “But you do need a lot of video games, I noticed. How many different systems you got here?”

  “Only an Xbox 360 and a PlayStation.” He paused, then added with exaggerated meekness: “And a Nintendo Wii.”

  She tossed a few pieces of popcorn
at him.

  He threw up his hands. “The kids,” he said.

  “And they get everything they want?” Her mock scowl turned into a knowing smile.

  “Well, actually . . .” Hutch said, “yes.”

  “Whoa,” Dillon said. “Cool.”

  Laura walked on toward the hallway that led to the bathroom. Over her shoulder she said, “You’re spoiling them because of the divorce.”

  “Well . . . duh!” Hutch called and smiled at Dillon.

  EIGHT

  Dillon plopped down in his mother’s place on the couch. He scooted closer to Hutch, seeming perfectly content.

  “Man, look at you,” Hutch said. “You’ve grown—what?—a couple of feet since I saw you last?”

  Dillon lifted his feet, parked them on the table, and waggled them. “Nope, these are the ones I’ve always had.”

  Hutch gave him a push. “Sharp as ever,” he said. “What do you think of Denver so far?”

  “It’s big.”

  “Next to Fiddler Falls, what isn’t?”

  Dillon shrugged.

  Hutch said, “Your mom tells me you’re using the bow and arrow set I sent you.”

  Dillon nodded. “I shoot it almost every day, when the weather’s good enough.”

  “So you’re getting pretty good?”

  “I shot a squirrel,” he said, excited. “While it was running up a tree!”

  “Really? Wow. Did I tell you I’ve been working on my moving-target shooting?”

  “How? What do you shoot at?”

  “There’s a bow hunters group over in Golden. They have a contraption that flings plastic Coke bottles in the air.”

  “And you shoot at them? With a bow and arrow?”

  “Well, I do shoot at them,” Hutch said. “Hitting them is another story. But I’m getting better.”

  Dillon shook his head in amazement.

  “That’s nothing,” Hutch said. “Have you ever heard of Howard Hill, the greatest archer who ever lived?”

  Dillon’s brow scrunched up in thought. “I don’t think so . . . You told me about Zhou Tong.”

  “Oh, yeah. Zhou Tong was something. Taught the Song Dynasty to be the best military archers in history. But Howard Hill, let me tell you.” Hutch hopped up, getting into character. “Okay, picture this. People coming from all over to see this guy. He comes out, big, handsome, fit. Kind of like me.”

  Dillon laughed.

  “He looks into the crowd and selects someone.” Hutch pointed majestically at Dillon. He grabbed his hand and pulled him up. “He tells the young lad, ‘Stand right here, and whatever you do, don’t move.’” Hutch positioned Dillon by the living room’s back window and squared his shoulders. “He takes an apple . . .” Hutch pretended to polish the fruit on his shirt and place it on Dillon’s head.

  “That’s William Tell,” Dillon said.

  “Mr. Tell used a crossbow. Doesn’t count.” Hutch waved his hand, shooing away such nonsense, and strode into the foyer thirty feet away. With exaggerated gestures he nocked an arrow onto a bowstring, raised the bow, and aimed at Dillon. He plucked back on the string and released. His face contorted in horror. He pressed his cheeks between his palms and ran toward Dillon, staring at an imaginary tragedy at the boy’s feet. “Oh my goodness, what have I done?”

  “Uh-uh!” Dillon said. “He didn’t do that!”

  Hutch straightened. “No, Howard Hill would split the apple. Then he’d do it with a plum. And when the crowd thought they’d seen everything, he’d have someone flip a coin in the air, and he’d shoot that.”

  “For real?”

  “I saw him do it in a documentary,” Hutch said.

  “Cool!”

  “I heard of another guy,” Hutch said, “who’d shoot aspirin out of the air. You can do just about anything with a bow and arrow. All depends how much you practice.”

  Dillon’s gaze was far off. Hutch could almost see inside his head, where the boy was shooting coins out of the air.

  Dillon walked to the table, stuffed his mouth with popcorn, and mumbled, “Can I see it?”

  “See wha—?” But Hutch got it before he finished the question.

  He felt an attachment to the bow he had used to save their lives in Canada. He supposed it was odd to give an inanimate object such value, but if anyone challenged him on his feelings, he’d tell them, You clobber Death when he’s breathing in your ear and see how you feel about the club.

  “Come on,” Hutch said.

  They walked out of the living room, through the entryway, and down the hall. Hutch put his hand on the back of Dillon’s head and brushed his fingers through his hair. He’d nearly forgotten how much Dillon had come to seem like his own son. Why had he let their phone calls become so infrequent? Why had it taken thirteen months to get Laura and Dillon to Colorado?

  As they walked, Dillon put his arm around Hutch’s waist. Hutch felt a vague ache in his chest. All the things he’d set aside to pursue Page: the long telephone conversations he’d enjoyed with Dillon and Laura; the times his own children were over and he’d done nothing with them except unveil the latest video game or DVD he’d purchased to keep them busy while he worked.

  What a jerk.

  He steered Dillon into the master bedroom and went to the closet. He pulled a long nylon bag off the top shelf and brought it to the bed. Unzipping it, he said, “I’ve done a few things to the bow.”

  “A few things?” Dillon said, excited. “Is that the same one?”

  In Canada, Hutch had fashioned a sapling into a longbow, which amounted to a smoothly arching bow with a string running from tip to tip. To make the bow stronger and turn it into a recurve, which he preferred, Hutch had laminated strips of maple to the front and back of the birch sapling. He had then carved a handgrip and arrow rest into the center of the bow, called the riser. Above and below the riser, the limbs arced in toward the shooter. Each tip, to which the string was attached, curved away from the archer.

  “I turned it into a recurve, like the one you have,” he said. “I’m more comfortable shooting recurves, so it’s more accurate for me. See this lighter wood running though the center?” Hutch said. “That’s the original sapling, the original bow.”

  Dillon caressed it. “It’s smooth.”

  “Took a lot of sanding, and some varnish.”

  “What’s this?” The boy was running his fingers over the material on top of the arrow rest, which the arrow slid over as it was drawn back and released.

  “Deer fur,” Hutch said. “It doesn’t interfere with the arrow’s flight the way some man-made rests can, and it’s practically silent.”

  “Cool. Can I pick it up?”

  “More than that,” Hutch said. “Think you can handle a sixty-pound draw?”

  Most kids couldn’t, but Dillon wasn’t most kids; Hutch knew he was tougher than he looked. And bow shooting almost every day? Heck, yeah.

  Dillon’s eyes flashed wide. “You mean I can shoot it?”

  “I mean, you can have it.”

  “Like, for keeps?” Dillon’s face lit up.

  “For keeps.”

  Hutch picked it up and handed it to Dillon in the manner of a king presenting a sword to his bravest knight.

  The boy looked it up and down, turning it in his hands. His expression grew serious, and he held it out to Hutch. “I can’t. You made it. It’s yours.”

  “Then it’s mine to give away, right? I know you’ll take care of it.”

  Dillon’s head bobbed up and down. “I will.”

  Hutch unzipped an inner pocket of the case and showed Dillon a quiver of arrows. “We’ll shoot a few times before you go home, then I’ll box it up and mail it to you.”

  Dillon beamed. “Thank you!”

  “For what?” Laura said, coming into the room.

  “Hutch gave me his bow.” Dillon held it up. “The bow!”

  “You don’t have to do that,” she told Hutch.

  “He’d get more out of it th
an I would. Especially up there in the woods. Unless, of course, you don’t want him to have it.”

  She rubbed her son’s back and leaned in close to his face. “I think it’d be okay, if you promise to be careful.”

  Dillon’s head went bobbing again. His big grin and sparkling eyes told Hutch he’d done the right thing.

  NINE

  The doorbell rang.

  “Finally,” Hutch said.

  Dillon put the bow back in its case, then zipped it. Hutch returned it to the closet.

  The bell rang again and again, over and over in quick succession.

  Laura smiled. “I think one of your kids is having fun.”

  Hutch made a face. “That’s probably my ex.” He headed out of the room.

  Dillon fell in next to him, and before they reached the front door, the boy gripped his hand.

  “Nervous?” Hutch asked.

  Dillon shrugged.

  “You and Logan are a lot alike. You’ll get along fine.” He opened the door and stepped back as three people streamed in.

  “Why does it always take you five minutes to answer your door?” Janet said.

  “Nice to see you too,” Hutch said.

  Janet’s eyes fell on Laura and narrowed.

  Hutch introduced them. Laura held out her hand, which Janet predictably ignored.

  “So you’re Macie?” Laura said. “You know, you’re prettier than your dad said. I didn’t think that was possible.”

  Macie beamed.

  Laura extended her hand to Logan. “Nice to meet you, Logan.”

  He lowered his eyes and shook her hand.

  “I heard you have a pretty cool set of grillz,” Laura said. “May I see?”

  The briefest of smiles touched his tight lips. He showed her his teeth.