Chapter 5

Before he returned to work, Eddie was kind enough to give us directions to the house Ryan Running Feet shared with his mother and younger sister out on the Rez. He was also kind enough not to charge us for the jump start when Rez Dawg predictably refused to start. After all was said and done, I think he was just happy to see our taillights - or the one that was working anyway.

I was mostly silent as Henry navigated his awful truck across town. The conversation with Eddie had left me in a pensive mood. It was hard not to contrast my fond memories of raising Cady with the difficulties Eddie was having with Brian. My daughter was as strong-willed and bull-headed as her genetics had dictated she would be, and we'd had our share of disagreements over the years, but I suspected I'd never be able to empathize with the kind of concerns Eddie and Donna were having to deal with. No parent ever really stops worrying about their child, but Martha and I had been able to relax slightly once Cady had gone from being a determined, serious-minded teenager to a determined, serious-minded young adult. We may not always see eye to eye on the choices she makes with her life, but, even at our most contentious, I'd never spent a night wondering if Cady was ever going to come home again.

"So, what do you know about Shane Parker?" I asked when Henry exited off the highway next to the sign that warned all comers that they were now entering Indian territory.

Henry frowned. "Nothing good." He took a right hand turn next to the elementary school, slowing briefly and raising his hand to acknowledge the gaggle of kids that were standing behind the chain-link fence that circumnavigated the playground, and waving furiously at the truck as we drove past. "He has been arrested several times on drug charges on the Rez."

"Dealing?"

Henry nodded. "Too much for simple possession, but not enough for intent to distribute. He is very careful to keep his quantities low enough to avoid federal prosecution, and he only deals on the Rez. Matthias' department is spread so thin, Shane and his cronies are able to do pretty much whatever they want. Occasionally, one of them will get busted, but they are never gone for long."

I recognized the grim tone in Henry's voice. Drug-related crime is the bane of law enforcement the world over, but it's an epidemic on the Rez. And Henry didn't take kindly to anyone who preyed on his people's desperation. Far too many of the Cheyenne and Crow had lost their lives to poison that was peddled as a metaphysical escape from their hardships.

I was wishing more and more vehemently that I had never let myself get dragged into the middle of this. "So maybe these trips the boys are going on are more than just music festivals and snowboarding."

"You think Shane is branching out – getting the other guys to sell for him?" Henry turned onto a rutted dirt road that made Rez Dawg shudder on her warped chassis.

I braced my feet against the pitted floor boards, trying to keep the fillings from rattling out of my teeth. "I don't know. Seems like an awful lot of risk for someone who is so careful on his home turf.

"Maybe the money is better in Bozeman."

"Undoubtedly."

The Running Feet property was located at the end of a long, curving dirt road which, at present, was populated exclusively by a flock of slow-moving chickens that only grudgingly moved away before Henry could run them over. The house itself was situated between an old barn on one side, and a newer garage on the other, and was centered at the base of a low hill that made it look as though the house were shrugging its shoulders. It was an older, modular home, but well maintained, and the shutters and front door were freshly painted, if with a somewhat eye-watering shade of Pepto-Bismol pink.

A young, dark-eyed girl that appeared to be somewhere in her early teens answered the door at our knock. She had her hair in a ponytail, oversized headphones over her ears and a dubious expression on her face. She propped the screen door open on her hip and cocked one side of her headphones up. "Yeah?"

"Hi there," I began with what I hoped was a winning smile. I was going to have to learn how to have a charming personality now that I didn't have a badge to get me in the door. "Is this the Running Feet residence?"

The girl rolled her eyes and dropped the bell of her headphones back over her ear, letting the screen door bang shut as she turned away. "Ma! Ryan's in trouble again!"

Henry quirked a smile at me. "His reputation precedes us."

"So it would seem."

Ellie Running Feet came into view, wiping her hands on a faded flowered dish towel. She was a diminutive woman in her late forties with thick, dark hair that she had twisted up into a messy bun on top of her head. "Hello, officers," she said, already looking resigned. "What has the boy done now?" Then her gaze landed on Henry and her expression shifted to puzzlement. "Henry Standing Bear? Since when are you with the law?"

Henry smiled. "I am often with the law, but I have never aspired to be of the law"

Without giving her time to follow up on that cryptic remark, I waded in. "No law here today, Mrs. Running Feet. I'm Walt Longmire. You've obviously met my friend Henry Standing Bear. We were just hoping you could give us some information about Ryan's recent trip to Bozeman with Brian Many Bridges. Have you spoken to your son recently?"

It took a moment for her to pull her gaze away from Henry – a state of affairs that I was more than used to after a lifetime of coming in second – but she still looked puzzled. "Bozeman?"

"Yes, ma'am. The music festival this past week?"

"Music festival?" She shook her head. "No, sir. Ryan wasn't at a music festival this past week. He's been working extra shifts up at his job. He just came home last night to catch up on his sleep."

"He's here now?" Henry and I exchanged a glance. It was quick, but not fast enough to go unnoticed by Ryan's mother.

She sighed and sagged a little as the resigned expression resettled on her face. "He wasn't working extra shifts, was he?"

"Well, ma'am, we don't know for sure…"

She waved a hand, saving us both from listening to my feeble attempt at reassurance. "Maybe you don't, but I do. That boy is no end of trouble." Her hand tightened briefly on the doorknob. "Would you mind waiting a moment? I'll go and get him." Without waiting for a reply, she let the screen door bang shut again, and then swung the inner door closed behind it. Even so, we could still hear her rousting her offspring. Loudly. In Cheyenne.

"Ryan! Nóavoo'ȯtse! Šé'šeotsėstse! You good for nothing…"

There was a resounding bang from somewhere deeper in the house, and the hollow core front door rattled in its frame. Out in the yard, a trio of birds startled and took flight. I eyed the door and tried to decide if I was going to have to save Ryan from his mother. If nothing else, we still needed to speak to him.

Henry merely leaned against the wooden porch railing and turned his face upwards, enjoying the last of the fall sunshine.

After a few minutes of banging and colorful swearing, the door was yanked back open and we were treated to our first sight of Ryan Running Feet. He was wearing a pair of plaid boxer shorts and vainly attempting to wrestle his way into a wrinkled Casper Drilling T-shirt, a feat made more difficult due to the fact that his mother was holding tightly to the lobe of his ear, yanking periodically while she continued to berate him, trading in and out between English and Cheyenne as the words seemed to fit the occasion.

"Nésáa-hová'ėhévéhe! Useless boy!" she said finally, giving her son's ear one last yank before she finally released him.

"Ow, Mama!" Ryan complained, ducking away from her so that he could finish pulling his head through the neck of his shirt. "Stop tugging on me!"

"I will tug on more than just your ear if you lie to me like that again, É-ononésto'eétahe," his mother threatened, poking him hard in the chest. "These men want to ask you about Brian. And you are going to talk to them."

Ryan, having finally regained some of his equilibrium, gave Henry and I a quick once over and then curled his lip up. "Man, you two aren't cops. I don't have to tell you shit."

Henry took a step forward, but before he could so much as open his mouth, Mama Running Feet was whacking her gangly baby boy in the back of the head with a wooden spoon that she had apparently palmed from the kitchen on her way back to the front door. "You don't speak to these men like that, you understand me? You don't speak to no one like that. You tell these men what they want to know!"

Ryan raised his hands, ducking again to get out of his mother's surprisingly accurate reach. "Ow! Shit, Mama, cut it out!"

"And don't you cuss at me!" Whack. "Didn't I raise you better than all that cussing?" Whack. Whack.

"Um," I said. I glanced at Henry. "Should I step in?"

"Only if you want to get hit too." He continued to look unconcerned. "I imagine she will tire out soon."

She did eventually run out of steam, though it took considerably longer than I would have expected. Certainly, it lasted longer than Ryan would have liked. With one last Whack, she holstered her weapon, and turned to drag Ryan bodily into the house by his collar. "You might as well come on in," she said over her shoulder as Ryan stumbled after her, complaining loudly the whole way. "He will talk to you now."

"After you," Henry said, opening up the screen door and gesturing for me to precede him into the house.

We followed the noise into the kitchen where Mama Running Feet had released Ryan to nurse his sore ear in one of the mismatched chairs around the table, and then turned to Henry and myself. "Now, would either of you like some coffee?"

"So, Ryan," I began, cupping my hands around the fragrant cup of coffee Ellie Running Feet had placed in front of me despite my protestations. "Tell me about the music festival."

"What do you want to know?" Ryan asked, sullenly slouching in his chair. "It was a music festival. There were bands and shit."

"And when did you last see Brian?"

"Two days ago, in Bozeman."

"You left Brian in Bozeman alone?" Ellie was still hovering around the edges of the room, having banished Ryan's younger sister, protesting back to her bedroom. "What kind of friend abandons someone so far from home?"

I glanced at Henry. He immediately stood and crossed the room to Ellie, expertly herding her out of the kitchen and into the back garden where they, presumably, began to discuss the finer points of cabbage cultivation.

"So," I said. "Tell me about Bozeman."

Ryan crossed his arms and looked away, but without his mother in the room, he seemed slightly more forthcoming. "It's not like we just drove off without him, you know. He wanted to stay behind. He said he'd take a bus or something when he was ready to come home."

"When you say 'we', you mean you, Donny Black Feather and Shane Parker?"

"Yeah. We all rode up together."

"But only you, Donny and Shane came home together?"

"That's right."

I nodded. "So, what made Brian decide to stick around?"

Ryan snorted. "What else? With Brian it's always some piece of ass."

"A girl?"

"Of course, a girl."

"What was her name?"

"Ryan shrugged. "Hell, man, I don't know. I didn't think she was all that hot, personally. But he said he was in love, so we left him to it. What was I supposed to do, knock him out and drag him home with me? If he wants to stick around Bozeman to get his dick wet, who am I to stop him?"

I ignored what I hoped was a rhetorical question. "What about his job at Casper?"

"I'm his friend, not his mom," Ryan said. "If he doesn't care whether or not he loses his job, why should I? It's like YOLO, you know what I mean?"

"I absolutely do not," I said.

Ryan just shrugged. "Look, he met this girl – I think her name was maybe Jenna or something like that. She was our waitress at the restaurant where we had dinner the night we got into Bozeman. He invited her to come to the festival with us, so she blew off work and came along. That's really all I can tell you."

"Do you remember the name of the restaurant?"

"It was a steak place, but I don't remember what it was called. It wasn't like Outback or anything. I think it was just local." Ryan sat back in his chair, and looked at me seriously for the first time. "Why are you asking all of these questions anyway? Did something happen to Brian?"

"Not that we know of," I said. "His mom is just a little concerned. She hasn't heard from him in a while, so."

Ryan shook his head. "She's all the time worrying about him like he's still her little baby boy or something. He just wants to go out and live his life, you know?"

"So, the last time you saw him, he wasn't in any danger?"

Ryan laughed. "In danger of being pussy-whipped maybe. The last time I saw him he was tonsil-deep in steak house girl."

"And where was that?"

"At the festival grounds. Death Trap Relay had just finished their last set, and we weren't really interested in sticking around for Black Fungus – "

At my blank look he elaborated. "They're bands, man, you know, music acts."

"Naturally," I said and gestured for him to continue.

"So, me and Donny and Shane packed up the van and told Brian we were heading out. He said he was going to stay. We said are you sure. He had his arm around what's-her-name, and said yeah, he was sure. So, we said peace out and headed home."

"And you're not worried that you haven't heard from him in a couple of days?"

"I mean, not really? We don't like chat or whatever. We just hang out after work sometimes – grab a beer, you know?"

"And that's it?"

Ryan shrugged. "I mean, yeah. That's really all I can tell you."

"And where are Donny and Shane now?"

"Home, I guess," Ryan said. "I haven't talked to them either. We're back on shift tomorrow, so I usually just catch up with them at the job site."

"Alright," I said. I stood and held my hand out. Ryan looked slightly puzzled for a moment before the finer points of etiquette reasserted themselves, and he shook my hand. "Thank you for your time. If you hear from Brian, or think of anything else that might help us locate him, I'd appreciate it if you would give us a call – or better yet, have him call his mother," I amended.

I joined Henry and Ellie in the garden as the sun reached its peak for the day and knocked the last of the chill out of the air. Ellie was scattering seed from a heavy cloth bag to a dozen or so enthusiastic brown chickens, one of which had taken a shine to Henry's boot and was roosting contentedly across his toes.

"I see you made a friend," I said.

"I am universally adored wherever I go," Henry said.

"Well, the chicks really seem to like you, anyway."

He gave me a long look. "That was terrible."

"I disagree. I thought it was some of my best work."

"You need to get better material." He lifted his foot and sent the chicken scurrying back into the melee. "Are we ready to go?"

"I think so," I said. I tipped my hat to Ellie. "Thank you for your time today, Mrs. Running Feet. It was much appreciated."

"Did that boy tell you what you needed to know?" she asked. "He is a foolish boy, but he is not so bad." She wrapped the bag up and tucked it back into the feed bin. "I still have hope that he will make something of himself one day."

"Boys that age make foolish decisions sometimes," I agreed. "But they usually settle down eventually. Sometimes they even become sheriff."

She laughed, but then her face clouded over as the thought occurred to her. "Do you think something happened to that boy Brian? He and Ryan have been friends for a long time. I hate to think of something bad happening to him."

I hesitated before responding. Offering any kind of personal opinion was always a touchy prospect. People tended to cling to any glimmer of hope like it was a guarantee, and I had learned in my many years of law enforcement that it was far better to offer no hope at all than it was to offer it and then have to take it back. "I honestly don't know," I said finally. "There's no reason to think anything has happened, but I know everyone would be a lot happier if he got in touch."

She nodded and looked up towards the house, where Ryan had just emerged, looking intently at his phone. "He is a foolish boy, but I am glad I know where he is tonight."

I knew exactly what she meant.

"Hey, Mr…uh, Sheriff?" I turned as Ryan approached us with his cellphone held out. "I was going back through my photos from the trip, and I found this. Do you think it'll help?"

I took the phone and rotated it so that I could see the photo that he had pulled up on the screen. It was a dark picture of Brian Many Bridges and an unfamiliar girl sitting next to a campfire. Brian's face was slightly blurred as though he had started to turn his head just as the picture was taken. The girl was looking at the camera with a shy smile on her face, one eye obscured beneath a generous sweep of dark hair. She was wearing a dark colored T-shirt with the outline of a cow on the left breast just below the word Roadhouse, and just above the name Janelle, spelled out in white embroidery.

"Do you mind if I send this to myself?" I asked.

"Sure, man," Ryan said. "Go ahead."

I was more than just a little proud of myself for remembering how to pull up the messaging application. I tapped in the numbers, hit send and handed the phone back to Ryan.

Almost immediately, it began to ring. Ryan answered, but didn't get any further than, "Hello?" before I heard the raised voice on the other end.

"Who the fuck is this?"

I sighed and held my hand out. "It's for me."

Ryan blinked and handed the phone back to me.

"Hey, Vic," I said. "It's me."

"Why the fuck did I just get sent a picture of a couple of teenagers cuddling in front of a fire?"

"I wanted a copy of it."

There was a beat of silence. "Walt, you have a cell phone now. Why didn't you just send it to yourself?"

I felt myself flush a little. "I couldn't remember the number."

There was another string of silence from the other end of the phone. "I swear to God, I am going to tattoo it on your fucking wrist." The line went dead.

I handed the phone back to Ryan and glanced at Henry. "Vic says hi."

"I am sure she does."

We thanked the Running Feet family, and saw ourselves out and back to the truck which, to my complete surprise, started on the first try.

"So," I said. "Feel like taking a road trip?"

Henry chuckled as he wrangled the truck through a lumbering three-point turn to face us back towards the main road. "You forget. I am not a man of leisure like yourself. I must still work for a living."

"Right," I said, and then reached for my phone. I redialed the number I had just called from Ryan's phone. "Hey," I said when Vic answered. "Think there's any chance your boss could give you a couple of days off?"

Nóavoo'ȯtse – lazy person

Šé'šeotsėstse – wake up!

Nésáa-hová'ėhévéhe – you are no good!

É-ononésto'eétahe – foolish boy

A/N: Well, it's only been like a YEAR since my last update. I have missed writing like crazy, but life just keeps getting in the way. Finished nursing school. Started working. Started another nursing program. Still planning on finishing this story – hopefully in more frequent installments than as of late! To those of you who have commented or messaged me over these past months, thank you from the very bottom of my heart. You have no idea how encouraging it is to know that there are still people who actually want to read this.

Please forgive what is no doubt a ham-fisted attempt at the Cheyenne language. My boo, Craig Johnson does a much better job, but then he has consultants, and all I have is google.

And thank you, Katie F, for agreeing to edit yet another chapter of run-on sentences and poor punctuation. She puts up with so much from me, and I am eternally grateful.