Tribute

ruined. I’ll be able to testify how anxious you were for everyone to leave you alone. If only we’d known.”
    “I’m not Janet,” she stated, and tossed the remaining contents in her glass into Cathy’s face.
    The action had Spock leaping up, the grumbling going to a snarl. As his head rammed against Cathy, Cilla grabbed for the bottle, saw herself smash it against Cathy’s head. But, impaired by the pills, she swung wide and barely grazed her temple.
    It was enough to have Cathy tipping in the stool. Cilla lurched forward, shoved while the dog jumped against the teetering stool. The gun went off, plowing a bullet into the ceiling as the stool toppled.
    Fight or flight. She feared she had little of either in her. As her knees buckled, she let herself fall on Cathy, raked her nails down Cathy’s face. The scream was satisfying, but more was the certainty that even if she died, they’d know. She had Cathy Morrow under her nails. She grabbed Cathy’s hair, yanked, twisted for good measure. Plenty of DNA, she thought vaguely as her vision dimmed at the edges. And Spock’s snarling barks went tinny in her ears.
    She swung out blindly. She heard shouting, another scream. Another shot. And simply slid away.
    FORD’S HEART SKIDDED when he saw Cathy’s car in his drive. He wouldn’t be too late. He couldn’t be. He slammed to a stop behind the Volvo and ran halfway to his door before his instincts stopped him.
    Not here. The farm. He spun around, began to run. It had to be at the farm. He cursed, as he’d cursed for miles, the fact that his phone sat on Brian’s bar.
    When he heard the shot, the fear he thought he knew, the fear he thought he tasted, paled against a wild and mindless terror.
    He threw himself against the door, shouting for Cilla as he heard Spock’s manic barks. Someone screamed like an animal. He flew into the kitchen. It flashed in front of him, etched itself forever in his memory.
    Cilla sprawled over Cathy, fists flailing as if they were almost too heavy to lift. Cathy with blood running down her face, her eyes mad with pain and hate as Spock snapped and growled. The gun in her hand. Turning, turning toward Cilla.
    He leaped, grabbing Cathy’s wrist with one hand, shoving Cilla clear with the other. He felt something, a quick bee sting at his biceps, before he wrenched the gun from Cathy’s hand.
    “Ford! Thank God!” Cathy reached for him. “She went crazy. I don’t know what happened. I don’t know what she’s on. She had the gun, and I tried—”
    “Shut up,” he said coldly, clearly. “If you move, I swear to God, for the first time in my life, I’ll hit a woman. Spock, knock it off! And I’ll make it count,” he told Cathy. “So shut the fuck up.” He aimed the gun at her as he edged toward Cilla. “Or I may do worse than knock you out. Cilla. Cilla.”
    He checked for wounds, then lifted her eyelid as Spock bathed her face frantically with his tongue. “Wake up!” He slapped her, lightly at first. “Move one more inch,” he warned Cathy in a voice he barely recognized himself. “Just one more. Cilla!” He slapped her again, harder, and watched her lids flutter. “Sit up. Wake up.” One-handed, he pulled her up to sit. “I’m calling for an ambulance, and the cops. You’re all right. Do you hear me?”
    “Seconal,” she managed, then braced herself with one hand. And shoved her fingers ruthlessly down her throat.
    LATER, A LONG TIME LATER, Cilla sat under the blue umbrella. Spring had gone, and summer nearly, she thought. She’d be here when the leaves changed and burned across the mountains. And when the first snow of the season fell, and the last. She’d be here, she thought, in all the springs to come, and the seasons to follow.
    She’d be home. With Ford. And with Spock. Her heroes.
    “You’re still pale,” he said. “Lying down might be a better idea than fresh air.”
    “You’re still pale,” she countered. “You were shot.”
    He glanced down at his bandaged arm. “Grazed” was the more accurate word. “Yeah. Eventually, that’ll be cool. I got shot once, I’ll say, rushing in—just a little too late again—to save the love of my life before she saved herself.”
    “You did save me. I’d lost it. I CSI’d her,” she added, wiggling her fingers. “But I was done. You and Spock—fierce doggie,” she murmured as she bent down to nuzzle him. “You saved my life. Now you have to keep it.”
    He reached over, took her hand.