I turn onto Main Street but can't park because of the onslaught of media lining the front of the station. What is going on in my town? I turn on the radio.
"Ruby you there?"
"No, it's me, Walt, where the hell have you been?"
"I'm here now."
"You'll never make it in here."
"Meet me in back"
"Copy that"
My strides lengthen as I approach the back alley door which swings open to reveal Vic's features set in stone.
She quietly yells at me with her finger pointing at my chest, her hip jutted out, "Walt, where the fuck have you been? All hell has broken loose!" Her finger giving way to her outstretched arm pointing to the unseen crowd on the other side of the building.
"I can see that." My hands fall naturally to my hips, gripping my sidearm and my magazines, respectively.
"Walt, I need you to promise me you won't overreact. I need you to be focused."
I don't say anything. Just nod my head the way I do.
She hesitates but spits it out, "Branch's dad tried to kill him."
"What?" My right foot falls forward as I lean on my hip staring at the angry brown eyes.
Her eyes are a little softer but still firm. She leans toward the backdoor putting herself between the building and me. "They were out shooting trap and Barlow admitted he was behind the plot to kill Martha…."
Everything pretty much goes black in my head. I can see Vic's animated features as she continues talking. I know she is explaining something I need to hear but my brain cannot quite catch up to her or what she is saying. Auditory exclusion, that's how Grossman explains it, and I'm experiencing it. The tips of her fingers land on my leather clad forearm offering a hesitant bit of compassion. Barlow is behind Martha's murder?
Vic's lips stop moving and we stare at each other as I ask her, "Tell it to me again," cueing my brain and my ears to listen and comprehend.
I catch up during the second rendition and hear, "Branch was gonna bring his dad in, Walt, but Barlow got a shot off."
"And?"
"It just grazed him. A sixteenth of an inch over and the buckshot would have taken out his head. He just had a couple of pellets slide by his thick ass head. Physically, he will be ok. Branch drug his dad into the station and Barlow is sitting in our jail right now, Walt. I don't know for sure how the press found out but they know and we have to deal with it."
"Branch is in there?" My hand glides through the air, my thumb juts out, pointing toward the Sheriff's office.
"Yeah, he won't go to the hospital until he sees you." She pauses, "You mind telling me where you've been?"
Vic clinches her jaw; her voice remains low but firm, wrapped in a gentleness that makes her uniquely her.
My mind is spinning, syncing the pieces, and stitching them together. Stepping closer, I move my hands from my hips, not answering her question because telling her about my final goodbye to Martha in a back alley is, well, it's just wrong. I step past her and open the back door waiting for her to step through the threshold in front of me. My hand falls naturally to her lower back as it has for the past year but this time she stops short. She turns into me, her hand on my arm, "Listen, Walt, I know you have gone through," she waits, her eyes train on mine, she continues emphasizing the present, "are going through a shit storm right now but Branch's dad tried to kill him after he tried to put him in custody for his involvement in Martha's murder. You need to remember that part of the story."
She takes one step toward me, her hand lands gently on my chest like she's sad she has to say it, "I'm really sorry, Walt. I mean it."
I know she means it just as I know there is more in her eyes than anger or sympathy.
The inside of the office is eerily quiet except for the loud hum of strangers on the street permeating the brick facade like cackles of geese. We haven't had this kind of activity since Sean's oil company brought the attention of the environmentalists. Even then, I ignored the thoughts I held about Sean and Vic being a mixed matched couple. Vic protecting her husband and not the other way around but today I cannot allow those thoughts to penetrate the surface of my conscious thought. There is too much at stake, too much for me, for her, and too much for Branch.
Ruby stands up from her desk and I can see the redness, her cheeks still damp from her tears, she touches my arm, softly, "Walter," is all she can muster. My lips fold into my mouth and let out with the smack of my teeth as my head slightly bobs up and down serving as tacit acknowledgement of our shared pain.
"Sheriff"
Ferg stands up, nearly at attention, and looks to me for guidance, my hand lands on his shoulder expressing the simplest measure of appreciation.
Branch is sitting at his old desk; the blood caked on his ear, his tears mixing with the blood and dirt making red clay on his face. He is staring out of the window at the posse of reporters eager for an exclusive.
Not long ago he attacked Vic just a few feet away and he and I had to tangle over this very desk. I was convinced he would have killed Vic that day and my fears only grew worse after he stole Travis' car hell bent on finding David Ridges. Standing here looking at him he seems so small and I am reminded of my head wound after counting coup with the painted dog soldier. The blood caked on my head, the raging headache, the pain in my ear and the comforting and unexpected touch of Vic soothing the pain away. She has become so familiar to me that I didn't notice she was so close, her body folded into me, touching me. My imagination blended into reality for a single moment in space and time that afternoon at the Red Pony.
Barlow is sitting silently in his cell. I turn back to Branch, "Branch," as my upper body twists to face him, my hands on my hips, my teeth clenched, my jaw set.
He looks over at me as a single trail of water flows down his cheeks.
"Walt", his Adam's apple slides up and seems to get stuck on it's way down and stops short; stopping any other words from his lips, but words aren't necessary right now. His pain is visceral. I look over at Barlow, sitting and staring at nothing, like he is already dead inside.
"He set all the wheels in motion, Walt. He's responsible for your wife's murder. I'm so sorry, Walt." The tears flow as a steady stream while he looks at me with every ounce of sincerity he can muster. I can't really explain to you how I feel right now except that I am numb, not really able to comprehend everything that is happening, that is being said to me.
"How is Nighthorse mixed up in this?"
"My dad paid him fifty-thousand dollars for the services of David Ridges because Nighthorse wouldn't do it himself."
My mind is putting the pieces together, Ridges goes to Denver and kicks down $800 to Miller Beck. For Beck, $800 might as well be a million dollars, and Beck stabs Martha and kills her. Ridges then kills Beck to silence the only witness to the crime. A crime conspiracy that would have remained a secret had Branch not found Ridges' fingerprint on Cady's tire. As the pieces click, turn, and fold into place I turn to Barlow.
"You hate me that much, Barlow that you would kill my wife and try to kill my child?" The words don't come out loudly they come out as cold pressed steel.
He looks over at me, acknowledging my presence for the first time, but he remains silent as his eyes shift toward Branch, then back at me, "I hate you and every pathetic excuse you stand for Longmire."
His eyes are cold. "You don't deserve this office, your family didn't build this land, build this state, and you don't deserve any of it. I've always hated you and your kind pushing your tentacles into my son. A son whose blood reaches back over a hundred years in this county who never should have lost an election to the likes of you."
"You killed my wife because of this badge, Barlow?" I feel weightless. My body is suspended in air. I'm going to kill him.
I watch myself turn and reach into Ferg's desk, taking out the jail key, inserting it into the lock. I feel the hands on my body. Someone is pulling my jacket. I see their mouths moving but I don't hear anything. Ruby's soft hands are on my face, and she is looking at me, her intense blue eyes are penetrating mine. "Walter, son, let justice be your weapon. Don't hurt him this way."
"Walt!" Vic's voice finally penetrates and I turn towards her and for the first time since I've known her I see panic and fear in her features. She didn't look like this even with a gun to her head but she looks terrified at this moment.
Her hand covers mine, and she slowly and quietly says my name. I look down at her hand and re-holster my Colt. I don't remember pulling my gun in the first place.
Ferg releases his grip from my shoulders and just as slowly I look at Branch, his face is blank like he can't believe the events unfolding before him. I capture Vic's stare, her brown eyes wide, and I turn back toward my office pushing the door closed behind me and I rush out of the private door. I scramble down the backstairs and hear light footsteps quickly approaching behind me. She catches up with me, pulling my coat sleeve, "Walt, wait." Her words come out like a bark. I stop, my palms press against the back door, halting her progress.
As I face her, pinning her against the brick building, I ask, "How do I explain to my child that her mother died at the hands of pure unmotivated evil? "
Her eyes search mine, they are filled with all the things I need but neither of us can say, "I don't know." She says as her hands rest ever so slightly on the open button of my shirt.
She steps into me, our bodies just short of touching completely, "I need you to promise me you won't do anything to jeopardize the case. I can't imagine what you are feeling right now but we have to look past this moment, Walt."
I hang on to the we in her words as I nod in agreement and walk away from her making my way to the Bronco. I struggle to find the right way to talk to Cady while I drive to meet her. I can't have her at the station, not with Branch and Barlow there and certainly not with the media there. I need time alone with my daughter.