St Kilda Consulting 01 - Always Time to Die

frowning.”
    “Talk about the pot and the kettle,” she said, too low for him to hear.
    He heard anyway. “You have salsa on your mouth.”
    Automatically she licked her lips. A spicy taste rewarded her. “Mmm, your mother sure can cook. Did she learn it from her mother?”
    “No.”
    To anyone with more sensitivity than a rock, the tone of Dan’s voice closed off that avenue of conversation.
    Irritation flared in Carly. She made her living asking questions about the past, and she was real tired of running up against roadblocks in the present. Especially with Daniel Duran.
    “Did her father like to cook?” Carly asked.
    “No.”
    “Grandmother? Grandfather? Aunts, uncles, elves?” she asked sarcastically.
    Dan wondered if she’d somehow found out. “Why do you care? She’s not part of Winifred’s project.”
    Carly blew out a frustrated breath. “You’re right. But your mother has the kind of kitchen that looks like it was handed down through generations, yet there weren’t any pictures on the wall of parents or grandparents. Kids, yes, the living room was lined with their school photos. Some babies, too.”
    “She and Dad put the kitchen together themselves from swap meets and secondhand sales. He built the greenhouse in back and the two bedrooms where the girls and boys slept. It was crowded, but a lot better than where the kids who were placed with us came from. Nobody shouted, nobody raised a fist, and nobody did drugs or sexual brutality.” The line of Dan’s mouth twisted when she flinched. “You see, Ms. Nosy, not everyone has a family they want to remember and record.”
    “Are you saying your mother didn’t?”
    “Ask her.”
    “I wanted to.”
    “And?”
    “Somehow I couldn’t get a word in edgewise without being rude.”
    “That’s your answer,” he said.
    “What?”
    “A very polite way of saying ‘None of your business.’”

QUINTRELL RANCH
MONDAY EVENING
12
    AT THE BACK OF THE QUINTRELL HOUSE , DAN PARKED HIS TRUCK , GOT OUT , AND closed the metal door. The sound carried like a shot through the darkness. Dogs barked but didn’t rush out. The air was clean, sharp, an icy knife blade against his nostrils. He breathed deeply, savoring the moment. Snow swirled around his head and gently bit his cheeks.
    It was a far cry from the toy-cluttered intimacy of Gus’s home, warm with love and the smell of the garlic chicken Dan had made for the Salvador family. The salad he’d carried in along with dinner was from Diana, as were the various herbal medicines she’d made to help them fight the flu.
    Usually Diana made her own deliveries, or had John do it for her, but tonight Dan had volunteered—even though half of the packages had been destined for the Quintrell ranch. His willingness to drive miles over a rough road on a cold night had surprised everyone, including himself. Like attending the Senator’s funeral, Dan didn’t know why he’d acted on the push of his instincts and taken the herbs from his mother; he only knew that he had.
    Maybe it was simply the full hunter’s moon overhead that made him restless, unable to sit in the small adobe house he’d rented on the edge of town or in the warmth of his parents’ kitchen or in the gentle chaos of Gus’s home. Outside of the buildings there were pastures glistening with snow and moonlight, dark fences and tree shadows where hunters waited in ambush, the soundless flight of an owl seeking a warm mouse. Dan had needed the living night in a way he didn’t question.
    But even now, standing in the midst of it, he was still restless.
    As he walked toward the kitchen entrance, scents from the packets of dried herbs he carried tickled his nose, bringing memories of hiking the valley and mountains with his mother during the snow-free months, gathering plants and seeds, shoots and roots and leaves. Some were used fresh, in teas and tinctures. Some were dried and pounded together with various fats to make salves, like the one weighing down his left jacket pocket right now. Others were tightly wrapped and stored for future use.
    He’d never asked about the source of his mother’s countless recipes for easing the pain of daily living among people who were too poor to be able to afford—or who didn’t want to use—Anglo doctors and pills. Probably he hadn’t questioned simply because he’d learned by the time he was six that his mother appreciated silence more than chatter. As for questions, they’d better be about