Out of Range

NINETEEN

"I apologize for Don," Stella told Joe as she walked him across the parking lot toward his pickup after the meeting had ended and he left Don, Illoway, Suhn, and Johnson at the table. "He gets so forceful at times he doesn't realize how he's coming across to people who don't know him."

"No need to apologize," Joe said, still a little stunned by his glimpse into Don's soul. He wondered if Stella had seen it, if she was used to her husband looking at her like that. He searched for something to say, feeling a bit flustered by Stella's presence.

"Thank you again for your help the other night," Joe said.

"You already thanked me."

She was wearing an oxblood turtleneck sweater and black slacks. The color of the sweater made her lips look even more striking than he remembered, like overripe fruit. She walked with a dancer's grace, as if her shoes didn't really touch the ground.

"Don's just not happy when he's not doing something really big," Stella explained, a little sadly. "I thought we were moving out here to retire, to ride horses and go rafting. I love to go whitewater rafting."

"This is a good place for it," Joe said, trying to make conversation, knowing how lame his response sounded.

"Please don't patronize me."

"Sorry." Joe felt his ears begin to burn.

Stella smiled slightly, and a little sadly. "The deal was that when Don sold his companies in New York and Pennsylvania, we would buy out here and really live. It was a choice between going to Aspen, Steamboat Springs, Sun Valley, Santa Fe, or here. We both liked the Tetons, so Wyoming was the winner. Your governor was one of the first people Don met, and we are among his biggest contributors. Don probably told you that."

"He left that part out," Joe said.

"I'm surprised. He usually leads with it."

"He told me about the vice president, though."

"Ah," she said. "I don't know why I'm telling you all of this. It's odd; it seems comfortable to talk to you. It's like I've known you."

Joe stopped at his pickup. The easy familiarity of their conversation had him flummoxed, and slightly alarmed. He felt comfortable with her, as if they had history together.

"Don's just frustrated," she said.

"Yup, I understand that."

Stella's black Lincoln Navigator was parked on the other side of Joe's pickup.

Joe said, "What I'm not sure I understand is the way he looked at you when you spoke up." He couldn't believe he said it, and felt immediately that he shouldn't have.

Stella paused, looked at Joe quizzically. "I don't know what you mean."

"For a second there," Joe said, treading into water he wasn't sure he belonged in, "he looked like some kind of reptile."

She smiled at Joe, a dazzle of white teeth framed by those lips. Her smile triggered something in him, and he knew he reacted to it.

"What?" she asked.

"It's kind of ridiculous," he said. "I just thought of something I hadn't thought of in a long time. In college there was this song I really liked called 'Stella's Smile.'"

"It was about me," she said.

"Really?"

"What, do you think I've spent my life married to Don Ennis? I'm just his most recent. I had a life, you know. I was in the music business in LA. Everybody in my crowd was in the business when I was in high school. I met the lead singer and he wrote that song."

"Really?"

"Yes, really," she said, a little exasperated. "Some people went to college, some of us went on the road. Some of us grew up real fast, Joe."

He stared at her.

"The lead singer originally called it 'Stella's Lips,' but luckily his manager talked him out of that, thank God."

"I've never met anyone who had a song written about them," Joe said.

"Now you have," she said dismissively. But he thought she was pleased that he knew. "I have a question for you. You said Don looked like a reptile. Do you use animal metaphors often when describing people?" She looked straight at him, with boldness, as she had in the restaurant when he first saw her.

"I've never really thought about it," Joe said, "but I guess I do."

"Someone else I knew did that," she said, and her recollection brought out an almost imperceptible flinch in her eyes. "I think it's kind of charming."

Joe grunted, wondering but not asking if she was referring to Will.

"What kind of animal would Pete Illoway be?"

Joe thought about it for a moment. "A wolf."

She laughed, apparently delighted. "Jim Johnson?"

"Bear."

Joe knew what was coming next.

"What animal would you say would describe me?"

He felt his face flush. "Can I get back to you on that?" he asked.

She smiled at him knowingly. "But will you?"

He hesitated. He liked being with her, liked watching her talk. She was an exotic species, charming and attractive, yet dangerous somehow. He was drawn to her, despite himself. He said, "I'm bound to see you again. This isn't that big a place."

"I've found it's as big or as small as you want it to be," she said. "Jackson is unique that way."

Joe reshuffled the files in his hands.

"You don't need to do that," she said. "I saw your ring last night. You saw mine. Is your wife here with you?"

"No, she's not," Joe said, "but she might as well be."

"Good answer," she said. Stella Ennis lowered her eyes and her lips tugged into a mischievous smile. It was as if she didn't quite know where to put them, Joe thought. "Stella's Lips."

"I had better be going."

"Yes, you had better be going," she said, agreeing with him.

Joe swung into the cab of his pickup, and when he looked back she was still there, beside his truck, looking like she wanted to say something else. He rolled the window down.

"Have you found the file on me in Will Jensen's desk?" she asked.

"File?"

"I assume there's a file." She nodded. "I had to sign a release form with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department in order to go on ride-alongs. You know, agreeing not to sue the state in case a horse bucked me off or a bear bit my leg."

"You went out with Will?" Joe asked, his tone more urgent than he wanted it to be.

"Not my choice of words exactly" she said. "I accompanied him on a few elk trend counts, and once to check an outfitter camp. I absolutely loved it."

If possible, Joe felt even more flushed than he had a moment before.

"I loved the realness of it," she said. "The rawness and the danger. I'm a junkie for authenticity, if there is such a term."

Joe swallowed, looked at her. "I saw you at the funeral."

She nodded.

"You knew Will pretty well, then? Were you and Will…"

"Yes, Joe," she said. "We were."

He tried to picture Will and Stella together. He could only picture Stella. He felt a surprising rush of jealousy.

She crossed her arms defensively. "I admired him. He was real. I thought he had a quiet honesty and dignity about him, unlike most of the species. He was straightforward and unpretentious. People mistook his earnestness for lack of intelligence, which was a tragedy. I respected him very much. You remind me of him."

Joe wasn't sure he bought it, but she seemed sincere. "Even though your husband didn't respect him?" he asked, deliberately not addressing the last part of her statement.

"Believe it or not, we don't think alike," she said, "much to Don's chagrin. Actually, he prefers it if I don't think at all, except to think about how much I admire him."

Joe was on thin ice and tried to think of a way off it.

"Do you have any idea why Will chose to kill himself?"

She stared at Joe for a long time, pursing her lips. He found himself staring at them, again.

"Maybe he didn't like what he'd become," she said vaguely.

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning," she said, "that I'll need to decide what I should share with you and what I shouldn't."

"I'd like to know," Joe said.

"You had better be going," she said again, and displayed a little wave.

Joe fumbled in his breast pocket for a business card and handed one to her. She took it and slipped it into the pocket of her slacks in one quick movement, as if she didn't want anyone to see. Joe glanced toward the building. Don was standing at the sliding glass door watching them.

Joe looked back at Stella, wondered if she'd seen Don watching them, if she cared.

"You felt it too?" she said. "When we met."

He knew exactly what she meant, but feigned confusion. She smiled. "I thought so."

He drove out of the lot into the sun-dappled trees. At the moment before the road curled into the timber, he chanced a look in his rearview mirror. She was at her car, opening the door, but looking back at him.

"Marybeth!" he heard himself shout into his cell phone.

"Joe, why are you calling now?" She sounded annoyed, her voice a loud whisper. "I'm in the middle of the audit at Barrett's I told you about. So unless this is an emergency, I can't talk."

Was it? he asked himself. Yes! "No, no emergency."

"Then call tonight, like we agreed."

"Okay."

"Joe, are you all right?"

"Dandy," he said, feeling as if he were telling a lie.