The Law of Moses (The Law of Moses, #1)

by Amy Harmon

If I tell you right up front, right in the beginning that I lost him, it will be easier for you to bear. You will know it’s coming, and it will hurt.

Whatever it was, when Moses came to Levan, he was like water—cold, deep, unpredictable, and, like the pond up the canyon, dangerous, because you could never see what was beneath the surface. And just like I’d done all my life, I jumped in head first, even though I’d been forbidden. But this time, I drowned.

I’d avoided Georgia since the incident in the barn. I didn’t know what to do with her. She was a wild card. She was a small town girl with a simple way of speaking and thinking, a frank way of being that turned me on and turned me off at the same time. I wanted to run from her. But at the same time, I spent all my time thinking about her.

I wanted to know everything about him. I wanted inside, and little by little, especially when he was painting, he was giving me glimpses, brief moments with him that I treasured up like a child collecting fragile shells and shiny pebbles. And when he wasn’t with me, I took out those treasures and turned them over and over in my mind, studying them from every angle, learning him.

DAD SAID HORSES REFLECT the energy of the people around them. If you’re scared the horse will shy away from you. If you doubt yourself he’ll take advantage of you. If you don’t trust yourself, neither will he. They are truth detectors. It isn’t rocket science. It isn’t voodoo. There’s a reason you give a horse his head if you’re lost. He’ll always take you home.

I’ve never known a man who couldn’t be helped by spending time with a horse. But it’s really up to Moses. You’re pretty headstrong, George, but you’ve met your match with that boy.”

You train a horse with pressure. Not pain. Pressure. A horse doesn’t want to get in the trailer? You don’t force him. You just run him in circles, round and round the trailer until he’s breathing hard. Then you try to take him up the ramp again. He doesn’t want to go? You keep running him. Eventually, he’ll figure out that the pressure lets up when he’s in the trailer. He gets to rest in the trailer. So he’ll climb that ramp eagerly every time.

“So is that what you’re trying to do with me? You want me to give you my head, just like the horse?” he called after me.

“See? The moment you quit chasing him, that’s when he wants you. He looks jealous. He thinks he’s been replaced.”

Lucky watched me come. He didn’t shy away or flinch as I drew near, and without allowing myself to hesitate, I grabbed his mane and swung myself immediately back up onto his bare back. He reared up once, spun a little, dancing and prancing, but I was ready for him and I held on. And he gave in.

But the best part was the way she seemed unconcerned and unbothered by it all, as if she was absolutely fine with the way her body looked and had no need to strut or pose or seek my approval.

My brain might be cracked, but it’s not just my brain. The sky is cracked too, and I can sometimes see what’s on the other side.”

“I’m a very ordinary girl, Moses. I know that I am. And I always will be. I can’t paint. I don’t know who Vermeer is, or Manet for that matter. But if you think ordinary can be beautiful, that gives me hope. And maybe sometime you’ll think

about me when you need an escape from the hurt in your head.”

“And Lucky is just like you!” I said. Moses just stared at me blandly, but I could tell he was enjoying himself. “Because he’s black?” “No, stupid. Because he’s in love with me, and he tries to pretend every day like he doesn’t want to have anything to do with me,” I shot back.

“Everyone always talks about being color blind. And I get that. I do. But maybe instead of being color blind, we should celebrate color, in all its shades. It kind of bugs me that we’re supposed to ignore our differences like we don’t see them, when seeing them doesn’t have to be a negative.”

“I like your skin. I love the color of your eyes. Am I supposed to just ignore that?” he whispered, and my heart galloped to the round corral, cleared the fence, and raced back to me in giddy delight.

Finding beauty in ordinary things. And the only rule is gratitude. My mom and dad use it all the time. Grumbling isn’t really allowed around my house.

Gratitude works best when you’re the one feeling it.”

But there are laws. There are rules. Laws of nature and laws of life. Laws of love and laws of death. And when you break them, there are consequences. And Moses and I, like a stream of fateful lovers who had gone before us and who would come after us, were subject to those laws, whether we kept them or not.

What was the appeal? The girl loved a challenge, that was easy to see. I’d watched her ride that black horse over fences and fields, flying like she belonged in the sky. I’d watched her coax and wheedle the stallion until he was so bewitched he now ran to her when she called him. But I wasn’t an animal and I didn’t want to be her

next conquest, and I was pretty sure that’s what I was.

Her voice rang out like a whip, and I felt the truth slash across my face with all the crack and sting that secrets wield. I stepped back, stunned that she had so easily unraveled this piece of me.

People liked religion but they didn’t want to have to exercise any faith. Religion was comforting with all its structure and its rules. It made people feel safe. But faith wasn’t safe. Faith was hard and uncomfortable and forced people to step out on a limb. At least that’s what Gigi said. And I believed Gi.

I saw those towering walls of water held back by the hand of a God who could do all things, a God who had done as one Moses asked, long before I lived. And I asked Him to do it again. I asked God to release the water. And Molly disappeared completely.

“That’s why I have that law,” he whispered, almost gently. “If you don’t love, then nobody gets hurt. It’s easy to leave. It’s easy to lose. It’s easy to let go.”

“You found me, Georgia. You chased me. You wanted me. Not the other way around,” Moses said. He hadn’t raised his voice. He didn’t even sound upset. “I didn’t break any of my rules. You broke yours. And you’re mad at me because of it.” He was right. He was absolutely right. And I was so wrong.

“Water is white when it’s angry. Blue when it’s calm. Red when the sun sets, black at midnight. And water is clear when it falls. Clear when it washes through my head and out my fingertips. Water is clear and it washes all the colors away, it washes all the pictures away.”

It was both manic and mesmerizing, it was controlled chaos and detailed dementia.

I’ve thought back on that moment so many times since then. Replayed it on a loop. The way I ran to him. The way I threw my arms around him, filled with compassion, completely unafraid. I held onto him as he stood there shivering, muttering something to himself. I think I asked him to tell me what happened. I don’t remember exactly. I just remember he was freezing, icy to the touch, and I asked him if he was cold.

And for the very first time, I ran away from him.

It was something that came naturally to me. Who can hurt you? Who is a physical threat? And Noah Andelin, with his sad eyes and his neat little beard, could be both, I was convinced of it.

I matched his tone and leveled my own flat gaze in his direction. “The same way I can see your dead wife, Doctor. She keeps showing me a car visor and snow and pebbles at the bottom of a river. I don’t know why. But you can probably tell me.”

I tried to be flippant, to force him out of his role as psychologist. I dug around in his life to keep him from digging around in my head. But the savage grief that slammed across his face slowed me down and softened my voice. I couldn’t maintain my attitude against his pain. I felt momentarily shamed and looked down at my hands.

“My wife, Cora, was driving home from work. They think she was blinded—temporarily—by the sun reflecting off the snow. It’s like that sometimes up here on the bench, you know. She drifted into the guardrail. Her car landed upside down in the creek bed. She . . . drowned.”

But Dr. Andelin was dialed in, his blue eyes intense and full of his own memories, and something else too. Gratitude. His eyes were full of gratitude.

“You think you’re crazy?” “I think I’m cracked.” That’s what Georgia said. But she hadn’t seemed to mind. Not until the cracks had gotten so wide she’d fallen in one and gotten hurt.

I waited, letting him talk. I didn’t know how she died any more than he did. That wasn’t what the dead wanted to share. They wanted to show me their lives. Not their deaths. Not ever.

“It doesn’t work that way. I don’t see the whole picture. Just pieces. I don’t always even know who the person belongs to. If I’m in a group, it could be anyone. They don’t speak. At all. And if they do, I can’t hear them. They show me things. And I don’t always know why. In fact, I never know why. I just paint.”

“They show me pieces. Memories. And I don’t always interpret them correctly. I don’t interpret them at all, you know? I’m not Sherlock Holmes.”

“I saw Molly long before I ever met you!” The truth of the statement suddenly slammed home. I had seen Molly long before I’d ever met David Taggert.

Tag was usually quick to smile, quick to anger, quick to forgive, quick to pull the trigger. He didn’t do anything in half measures and I wondered sometimes if the facility wasn’t

“So how do you know what they want?” he asked. “They all want the same thing.” And strangely, they did. “What? What do they want?” “They want to speak. They want to be heard.” I hadn’t ever put it into words, but the answer felt right. “So they don’t speak but they want to speak?” I nodded once, affirming that Tag was correct. “Why do they want to speak?” “Because that’s what they used to do . . .” I hesitated. “That’s what they used to do, when they were alive?” Tag finished for me.

“Sometimes it feels like that. It can be a flood of color and thought, and I can only pick up random things because it’s coming at me so fast. And I can only really see what I understand. I’m sure they would like me to see more. But it isn’t that easy. It’s subjective. I usually see pieces and parts. Never the whole picture. But I’ve gotten better at filtering, and as I’ve gotten better, it feels more like remembering and less like being possessed.” I smiled in spite of myself, and Tag shook his head in wonder.

And I realized it didn’t always have to be a weapon. What I could do didn’t have to hurt people.

“We can’t escape ourselves, Tag. Here, there, half-way across the world, or in a psych ward in Salt Lake City. I’m Moses and you’re Tag. And that part never changes. So either we figure it out here or we figure it out there. But we still gotta deal. And death won’t change that.”

“Honestly, I don’t trust myself to be alone just yet. And if I go back home to Dallas I’ll drink. Or I’ll die. So I need you.”

We would make an odd pair. A black artist and a white cowboy.

We were both stuck. Lost. With nothing to hold us down and no direction. I just wanted my freedom, and Tag didn’t want to be alone. I needed his money, and he needed my company, sad as it usually was.

I had been weak, and my weakness had created a child, a child who had no father.