Joe Pickett, page 2
“The navy? Had you even seen the ocean at that point?”
“Nope. That’s why I was considering it.”
“The navy seems like an odd choice for a guy who grew up here in Wyoming,” Sheridan said. “But I’ve got some friends I went to high school with who joined. Why do you suppose that is?”
Joe shrugged. “I’m not sure I know the answer in every case, but I think for guys like me the terrain around here is kind of ocean-like, don’t you think?”
As he said it, Joe chinned toward the wild country passing by outside the truck windows. To the east were hundreds of miles of treeless sagebrush flats that stretched to the valley floor. To the west and north was a massive carpet of pine trees climbing up toward the summit of the Bighorn Mountains. There wasn’t a structure or power pole to be seen.
“Okay, I kind of get it,” Sheridan said. “It’s the emptiness like the ocean.”
“Yup. Anyway,” Joe said, “I’m glad I made the choice to go to college for a couple of reasons. One is we were between hot wars at the time and I didn’t want to do my stretch in peacetime. The second reason is that’s where I met your mother.”
The memory of it made him smile. “To this day, I still can’t believe she was interested in me. She was a popular girl, as you can imagine, and she came from Missy’s money. But we clicked and the rest is history.”
“No, it isn’t,” Sheridan said with a scowl. “We aren’t done here.”
“I was hoping we were,” Joe said.
“So, Missy never approved?”
“She still doesn’t. For the first ten years, she thought I was a forest ranger. She still might, for all I know.”
Sheridan laughed.
“That’s when my life really started as far as I’m concerned,” Joe said. “When I met your mother. Not before. Until I met your mom, I was just another stupid jamoke. I probably wouldn’t have graduated or applied to be a game warden.”
“But it worked out,” Sheridan said. “You got the job you always wanted.”
“I thought I owed Victor that,” Joe said. “And your mother has a way of keeping me on track.”
“You and me both,” Sheridan said.
“You know,” Joe said, “your mom didn’t have it easy growing up, either. I thought she did when I met her and I learned later it wasn’t the case. Can you imagine growing up with Missy? Somehow, your mom got through it and she’s nothing like her mother.”
“She’s self-made,” Sheridan said. “Just like you,”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“You both found each other and started a fresh life together.”
“Yup.”
“You’ve done a good job of it,” she said.
Joe looked away. He had nothing to say except, “Thank you.”
“It was tough for a while,” Joe said as they cleared town and took the turnoff for Hazelton Road. “That’s what happens to rookie game wardens—you take what they give you. We moved all over the state: Lovell, Elk Mountain, Lusk, Newcastle, Moorcroft, and finally here.”
“That’s why I was born in Elk Mountain,” Sheridan said. “It’s on my birth certificate. I always kind of liked that.”
“Actually, the hospital was in Laramie,” Joe said. “Elk Mountain doesn’t even have a clinic.”
“Why have you stayed here?” Sheridan asked. “I know you’ve had opportunities to move to other districts. Cool places like Jackson Hole or Cody?”
“This is our home,” Joe said. “Simple as that.”
“Are you ever going to take a job at headquarters in Cheyenne?”
“Never.”
“Are you ever going to run for office? I know some people wanted you to run for sheriff a few years back.”
“That’s true,” Joe said. “But I’m not a politician.”
“You’d be a good sheriff,” she said.
“I’d be a lousy sheriff,” Joe said. “If I was sheriff, I’d spend all of my time trying to figure out how to leave the office and go up into the mountains. Plus, I’d have to run for office every few years and I know I’d hate campaigning. I think it would be embarrassing.”
“I believe you,” Sheridan said. Then: “Tell me about the time you got shot.”
“It hurt.”
“That’s it?”
“Bullets really hurt.”
Sheridan paused with her pen above her pad, waiting for more.
“It’s not like what you see on television or movies,” Joe said. “Or what you might read in adventure books. It’s not like a gun goes bang and the bad guy falls over dead. Or like when the good guy is shot in the shoulder and just keeps going, but a day later he seems just fine.
“In real life, when you get shot a hot piece of metal enters your body and ploughs through all your soft tissue—or it breaks your bones. And even if it doesn’t hit a vital organ, you just have to hope that you don’t bleed out. It’s awful, really. You never fully recover from it. I think your life changes once you’ve been shot.”
“Wow,” she said. “I never thought about it like that.”
“I hope you never have to,” Joe said. Then: “It hurts when you get your ass kicked, too.”
“Do you mean a physical altercation?”
“Yup. I’ve had a few of those over the years and I rarely came out on top. Of course, I was also chewed on by a wolverine and nearly killed by a quadriplegic old woman in her wheelchair. Brenda Cates. She tried to roll over my head but I dumped her out of her chair and subdued her. It wasn’t my finest hour.”
Sheridan rolled her eyes.
“When you mentioned bullets a minute ago, that brought up something I always wanted to ask,” Sheridan said.
“Shoot,” he replied with a grin.
She ignored the pun. “I know it drives some of your colleagues crazy that you’re known for being a bad shot. I’ve heard other game wardens and law enforcement types grumbling about it. Does that bother you?”
“That they grumble about it or that I’m a bad shot with a handgun?” Joe asked.
“Either.”
“I am a bad shot with a handgun,” he said. “I’ve barely qualified every time I have to test and, on a couple of occasions, the instructor kind of looked the other way and let me slide.”
“Well,” she asked, “Can you explain that?”
He shrugged and said, “I guess I never really think I’ll need to draw my gun again in the line of duty. It’s happened from time to time, but I’d rather deal with situations in other ways if I can. I’ve never wanted to be a shoot-first and ask-questions-later kind of guy. I think too many folks in law enforcement want to draw their weapons. I want to not draw mine if I can help it.
“Besides,” he said, “I’d rather rely on my shotgun. I’m pretty good with that.”
He was grateful for what Sheridan didn’t ask next, and Joe sensed that his oldest daughter was struggling with the same thought.
Because he didn’t want to recount the times he’d hurt adversaries or out-and-out killed them. Once, he’d shot one of the Scarlett brothers in the head from two inches away because the man had nearly caused the death of all three of Joe’s daughters. Joe still regretted his uncontrolled anger at the time, but he knew he’d likely do it again in the same circumstances.
In another instance, he’d found himself up against a local outdoor legend named Smoke Elser in the Teton Wilderness outside of Jackson Hole. Smoke was hiding from the feds and he had wrongly assumed that Joe had come to arrest him. The result was an Old West shootout Joe was unable to talk himself out of. He still recalled what he told Marybeth about it afterwards: I just killed the only man in Jackson Hole I really understood.
There were others over the years, and Joe didn’t want to talk about any of them, either.
“Nate thinks you’re too by-the-book, doesn’t he?” Sheridan asked.
“He does. I can live with it.”
“Do you know that when you call him on his cell phone a picture of Dudley Do-Right comes up?”
“Yup. I can live with that, too.”
“Speaking of Nate, he’s a good friend to you and our family, isn’t he?” she asked.
“He’s the best,” Joe said. “I can’t say I agree with his code of justice or his philosophy. He has absolutely no faith in our justice system and he prefers to do things outside the boundaries or procedures of law. I can’t endorse that world view.”
“But he gets things done, doesn’t he?” Sheridan asked slyly.
“He does. I just wish the body count wasn’t so darned high.”
“I’m glad he’s on our side,” she said.
“Me too, but I worry about him, though. I’m always afraid he’s going to get into something so deep he can’t get out of it and I can’t help him.”
“What will you do if that happens?”
Joe shrugged. “I guess I’ll do my best to be there and to do what I can. And I’ll continue to pray for him. That’s all I can promise.”
“I’ll do the same.”
“Okay,” Sheridan said, “Here’s a trick question. If you had to choose between riding a horse or driving an ATV in the mountains for the rest of your life, which one would you pick?”
“For the rest of my life?” Joe asked.
“That’s the question.”
“Hmmm. On one hand, ATV’s can be turned on and off with a key and they’re very reliable. You can use them to navigate just about any kind of terrain and they’re stable and sturdy enough to load up with gear or strap a dead elk to the back. Also, ATVs don’t get tired.
“On the other hand,” Joe continued, “Horses as a species are on a sincere quest to go extinct but we just won’t let them, I believe. If there is a single stray nail in a pasture, you can count on the fact that a horse will find it and step on it and injure himself. Or if you’re riding along and a bird flies up ahead of you on the trail, your horse may spook and throw you out of the saddle and run away.”
“So I think your answer is obvious,” Sheridan said with dismay.
“I’d go with my horse,” Joe said. “Definitely.”
“But, all those reasons …”
“Yeah, well. But ATVs don’t have hearts and they don’t have souls. If you crash, an ATV won’t come back for you and it can’t warn you at night that a bear is near the camp.
“Plus,” Joe said with a wink, “Your mother would kill me if I didn’t answer this the way I did.”
“I would, too,” Sheridan said.
His truck trailed a roll of dust as it continued up Hazelton Road into the Bighorns. After passing several million-dollar homes of pseudo ranchers, the condition of the houses got worse the further they travelled.
Whip and Quirt lived in a rental shack at the end of the line. Joe slowed down and pulled off the county road. Whip’s battered red pickup was parked in front of the house at a reckless angle.
“They’re here,” he said. “Remember what I said about staying in the truck.”
“I remember.”
“Keep your cell phone handy, though,” Joe said. “Just in case.”
She nodded that she understood. “So, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to walk up to their front door,” Joe said. “Along the way I’m going to see if there is blood in the bed of the truck, which I suspect there is. Then I’m going to look inside the cab for a rifle and a bone saw which is probably there. Then I’m going to knock on the front door in a friendly way.”
“And when Whip answers,” she said with a smile, “You’ll say, ‘I guess you know why I’m here?’”
“Exactly.”
“I remember,” she said. “You never know what they’ll blurt out.”
“Sometimes they confess on the spot,” he nodded. “Sometimes they think I’m referring to another crime they committed that I may not even know about. And, more often than not, they throw their partner in crime under the bus.”
Sheridan said, “I’ve always thought it was a pretty clever way to start a conversation.”
“I never know where it’s going to go until I ask that question.”
“You’re cleverer than most people realize,” Sheridan said. “And you’ve got the gift of always being underestimated.”
“The trick is not to let that bother you,” he said with a wink.
Before he climbed out, he paused and looked at her. “You didn’t tell me what this essay was about.”
“I didn’t?”
“Nope.”
“Professor Cleveland asked us all to write about someone we most admire.”
Joe opened his mouth but couldn’t speak. He felt his eyes get moist and he looked away for a moment.
“Go arrest those dudes,” she said. “Then let’s get back home and eat some turkey.”
About the Author
C. J. Box is the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of more than twenty-two novels including the Joe Pickett series. He won the Edgar Award for Best Novel for Blue Heaven, as well as the Anthony Award, the French Prix Calibre .38, the Macavity Award, the Gumshoe Award, the Barry Award (twice), the Western Heritage Award for Literature, and the 2017 Spur Award for Best Contemporary Western. His novels have been translated into twenty-seven languages and millions of copies of his novels have been sold in the United States alone. Open Season, Blue Heaven, Nowhere to Run, and The Highway have been optioned for film and television.
A Wyoming native, Box has worked as a ranch hand, surveyor, fishing guide, a newspaper reporter and editor, and he owned an international tourism marketing firm with his wife, Laurie. In 2008, Box was awarded the BIG WYO Award from Wyoming’s Hospitality and Travel Coalition. An avid outdoorsman, Box has hunted, fished, hiked, ridden horseback, and skied throughout Wyoming and the Mountain West. He served on the Board of Directors for the Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo and is currently serving on the Wyoming Tourism Board.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
Copyright © 2024 by C. J. Box
Cover design by Mauricio Díaz
ISBN: 978-1-5040-9429-0
This edition published in 2024 by MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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C. J. Box, Joe Pickett
