A Shoot on Martha's Vineyard Read Online Free Page A

was I only imagining things? Was I just being jealous?
    â€œCome to think of it,” Zee now said, looking at me with a parody of a frown, “what do you mean when you say all women are actresses? What sort of a sexist thing is that for a nineties kind of guy to say?”
    â€œI’m a late nineties kind of guy. I’m in my post-sensitive period.”
    â€œI see. And when were you in your sensitive period?”
    â€œIt happened fast. You had to be watching for it.”
    Her hand squeezed mine. “I don’t think you’ve quite left it yet. But what’s this actress notion you have?”
    â€œHow about women faking orgasms because guys fake foreplay?”
    She sniffed. “Oh, that . . .”
    I became conscious of silence in Joshua’s room. “I’ll be right back,” I said, and trotted downstairs.
    Joshua was snoozing, not dead. He looked soft and sweet. I gave him a kiss on the forehead and went back upstairs.
    I decided to change the subject while I had a chance. “I saw Manny Fonseca downtown when I was selling the fish, and we talked about this and that. He sends his regards and wonders if you might want to do some more practice tomorrow.”
    To everyone’s surprise, especially her own, Zee had fairly recently discovered that she had an amazing knack for shooting the very pistols she had always viewed with distrust and alarm. With Manny, the local gun fanatic, as her mentor, she had quickly become a far better shot than I had ever learned to be, in spite of my training in the military and the Boston PD, and had, in fact, started attracting attention at contests Manny had persuaded her to enter. As she continued to practice and compete, her enthusiasm had mounted. She was, as Manny often said, a natural, and after Joshua had been born, he’d not waited long before luring her to the pistol range once more.
    Now she looked at me. “Tomorrow will be fine. I have to get ready for that October competition.”
    â€œI’ll stick cotton in Joshua’s ears,” I said, “and we’ll both watch you pop those targets.”
    She gave me a smile. “Pistol-packin’ momma?”
    â€œWhen the other kids learn about your gunslinging, nobody at school will try to beat up our boy. I could have used a mom like you when I was a kid.”
    Her smile got bigger, more genuine. “I’m sure nobody ever beat you up. You probably beat them up, if they tried.”
    â€œLike my sister says: There’s never a bronc that’s never been rode, and never a rider who’s never been throwed. I got pounded a few times.”
    My sister Margarite lives near Santa Fe, and, like many Eastern transplants, prides herself on her knowledge of Western lore.
    Neither of us had had a mom for long, ours having died when we were young, and our father, a one-woman man, never having remarried.
    â€œI like shooting that forty-five Manny’s got me using,” said Zee. “My only problem is that I feel I should be with Joshua all the time even though I know that I can’t be. I keep hoping that if I keep shooting, it’ll wean me. I have to be weaned sooner or later.”
    Zee had taken a two-month maternity leave from thehospital where she worked as a nurse, but now was back at work part-time.
    â€œYou don’t have to shoot or go back to work if you don’t want to,” I said. “We’ve got enough dough stashed away to keep us alive for a year or two, as long as we don’t live too high off the hog. Besides, if I absolutely have to, I can get a regular job.”
    In the years since I’d retired from the Boston PD and moved to the island, I had managed to avoid anything resembling a steady job. Like a lot of people on Martha’s Vineyard, I had, instead, brought in money in a variety of ways: looking after other people’s boats and houses during the winter, doing commercial fishing and