Wear Something Red Page 7

  Chapter 7

  In the seventeen years since she’d left, Dominion had seen enough sprawl to the east that a few neighborhoods had started going up into the foothills. The curving sweep of the mountains from the west-northwest around to the northeast defined the crescent shape of the valley and provided a small rain shadow east of Dominion. It wasn’t as dry as the east side of the Cascades, but the change was noticeable after they left the city. Evergreens thinned out, plant growth became sparse, succulents appeared at the sides of the road and up along the dry slopes that also displayed tall, vellum-hued grass and patches of bare, dry land this late in August.

  After about six miles of warm-up, just as Ditchburg Road began rolling up and down northward into the hills, they started their friendly competition. The road wasn’t in the same condition it was when she was fourteen. It was new then. Now it had cracks, crumbling shoulders, frost heaves, some of which had been badly repaired, and potholes.

  Shana, three inches taller, had the same natural strength in her legs as her mother, but she’d been reluctant to take riding seriously. She preferred the heptathlon, which provided a more versatile outlet for her formidable athletic talents.

  “She doesn’t want to disappoint you,” Michael had told her.

  “How could she possibly disappoint me?”

  “She’s seen the trophies. She knows you would have made the Olympic team if not for that crash. What if she can’t do that?”

  “She’ll do better than I ever did once she commits to it.”

  “I agree. You two leave me in the dust. She could ride you into the ground if she set her mind to it. Just let her come into her own. Then you will both be happy.”

  They raced back and forth, taking the lead, drafting, working together as if they were a breakaway pair trying to catch the leaders of an imaginary race and stay ahead of the peloton behind them. Then they would try to drop each other.

  Shana was a fantastic sprinter, good enough to ride on the track if she wanted to. She was also good on her feet, having run an 11.6 100 meters in June to set an Oregon age-class record. She would race out into the lead, leaving a larger gap each time that Joan had difficulty closing. Thank goodness for the uphill portions.

  She could still leave Shana behind going uphill, though it hurt more than ever before to do it.

  Renovating the house and riding would set down roots in Dominion. It was how she had settled herself in Portland when they moved there from San Francisco. She got to know the best riding routes. She became familiar with the building supply and home improvement outlets in Portland. Once she’d accomplished that, the city belonged to her. She and Shana were going to do the same thing in Dominion. They would make this their town, their home.

  For now, they were just enjoying themselves. She could ride like this forever as long as Shana was with her.

  Shana, about six lengths ahead of her, looked back, smiled and started her sprint along the extended flat section of Ditchburg Road that would eventually lead to the turn off to Quarrelle Lake.

  “Oh, yeah.” She changed gears, got out of the saddle and took off after her daughter.

  She started to close the gap. Shana was going to be far better than she ever was, but she could still catch her. She peddled as fast as she could. The gap closed. Shana was only fourteen. Even a 6’1” teenage goddess couldn’t keep up this speed forever; not yet, anyway. She lowered her head for the big push, glanced up and felt her thirty-six years of life grab hold of her thighs.

  The goddess looked back at her, smiled again—smirked really—found another gear and left her mother behind as she made for the curve in the road ahead of them. But the goddess with the ponytail bobbing out from under her helmet didn’t know what her merely mortal mother knew.

  Joan eased her pace and followed Shana around the curve about ten lengths back. Once she’d cleared the curve, she spotted Shana pedaling hard but no longer trying to drop her mother because about two hundred meters ahead was the steepest and longest hill they were going to face on the ride. It wasn’t Tour de France tough, but it slowed Shana enough for her mother to catch up. If only she could get a bit more air into her lungs and a bit more lactic acid out of her thighs.

  She didn’t catch Shana until they were near the top of the hill. From there, they rode together along another flat stretch of road. Soon, Shana would have her on the hills, too; perhaps by next Friday.

  “We go down one more hill,” she said. “It’s about a mile.”

  They reached the old forestry road five minutes later, got off their bikes and started drinking water. She gasped for breath and massaged her thighs. Shana wiped away a bit of sweat from her forehead.

  “Up there is where I got my painful introduction to mountain bike racing.” She pointed to the gravel road curving up into the mountains.

  “You’re not going to get into your way-back machine again, are you?”

  “I broke my left collar bone. Something like that tends to stick with you.”

  The road was overgrown, barely identifiable as a road except for two gravel tracks and the metal-bar gate that blocked access to it fifty feet off Ditchburg.

  “That’s strange. I guess you really can’t go home again.”

  “Suits me.”

  She poured some water over her head. The air felt about ten degrees hotter than when they’d started riding. “Let’s agree to take it easy on the way home.”

  Before Shana could respond, they heard two gunshots quickly followed by two more. A memory flash had her reaching for a gun she didn’t have before running to Shana to get her to cover.

  Shana sidestepped her lunge and grabbed her shoulders from behind. “Who are they?”

  Two huge men emerged from the woods on the other side of the gate. They each carried automatic rifles equipped with scopes.