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"DON’T WORRY, MOM-SHRINK," a mischievous Ric told Helena Troy Burnside as we escorted her and her chic Chanel carry-on bag to the airport waiting area the next day "It e"

He leaned in to kiss her cheek and drew quickly back, to duck her reaction

"You cactus-tongued young devil" Helena’s mock annoyance ended with a set it Yesterday was all revelation and darkness and angst, and now you two crazy kids are acting like"--she suddenly did get it--"… honey …it out in private therapy," Ric told her "Hard"

She shook her head "Just don’t go off and do anything foolish without sendingrash," I assured her, "or requiring dyed-to-match satin sandals"

"I’m always an email or phone call away," she reassured us in turn

I leaned in, feeling aard I smelled an old-lady-type perfume like Estée Lauder White Linen (a naering whiff of psychic shell shock

I iht hands on her silk-suited sleeves and kissed her sirl

"Delilah, dear--" Helena embraced me back to cover the sudden tears in her eyes "It’s been a privilege to be with you at … this watershed time in your life"

She turned almost blindly to click off on her kicky Stuart Weitzate

"Kiss-ass," Ric whispered ht Helena secretly would have liked a daughter"

I couldn’t meet his eyes as fast as I wanted to "She’s a cool lady We both owe her"

We walked away fro an arm over my shoulders "You did that like a pro, chica Bueno Brava"

"So, favorite son," I asked, overdue inon from my Hallet Helena out of town so fast?"

Our pace had picked up and Ric rass and I have haven’t been just spying on cows and zo sentimental journeys to Old Wichita land for a nexus"

"A new brand of car?"

"A Nexus GM would love that Not bad , but no We no the what and why of weird events that have been going on in Wichita lately, but not the who and where So, it’s tiative track and take these suckers down Okay by you?"

"Very okay"

"That doesn’t preclude nocturnal ti until I elbowed him in the Dos Equis six-pack

BY THE TIME we reached a de-wheel black pickup was parked alongside her, with Quicksilver on guard in its high e into the terh his rolled-do "That your foster mother?"

Ric nodded

"She rass shook his head and reinstalled his straw Stetson "Always knew there wasn’t any justice in the universe" He nodded at the high-riding pickup’s rear "No dogs risk their lives to ride in my truck bed, not even your whip-set down your Dolly Parton’s top, and I’ll lead you three to the ht Wichita has ever seen"

"TALLGRASS IS A character," I told Ric as he drove Dolly two tailpipe-lengths behind the black pickup

"He plays on that, yeah Since he’s Native American, people underestied that"

"And you’re wearing your silky, pale Vegas suit today, dude," I pointed out "That for seeing off ‘Morass’s orders And, except for those fashionista hair plaits, you look ultra-reporterly, as I requested, in those closed-toed puirls’ school suit"

"Was that a personal or professional request?" I asked

I et his Ric liked me either very buttoned up or very stripped and unzipped, although he’d put up with in-between if he had to

"Professional," he answered pro into the devil’s den today"

"And you won’t tell me any more?"

He shook his head "You work better as an investigator on instinct"

"Really? That could be a put-down"

"Really, Del And it’s a co, but if you want to strike out on your own, do it You have those sterling-silver instincts Where is that little devil now, anyway?"

I had to think about it, finally dredging up a thin silver chain fro of my jacket

"Would you believe," I told hi on a chain around raduated on scholarship"

"I’ Tallgrass on a left turn and then gawking up at the sky "Wow Would you believe that?"

I was still clinging to the pro when I looked up past Dolly’s red visor to an endless blue sume icon , west side of town Obviously, the big-time action was all on the east side, where the sun rose

Well, usingand a couple of ex-FBI guys to accompany my triumphal entrance to the Emerald City of Wichita

Hah! Even Quicksilver looked a tad worried about driving right under the Erass had parked our bulky vehicles beside each other in the lot, we paused to gaze up and up at the slick towers so like a cluster of giant sparkling water bottles, green and shiny

"Fits the prairie setting They look like plastic silos," I coh his high driver’s seat

"Don’t tell ht like a cornered wolverine to get this opportunity for our tribes"

"This is a Native American project?" Ric asked

"Yup First one outside reservation land Whole neorld, aum in his mouth and chewed it like a wad of Red Man "I did ot this far and is in there dealing with the white man even now"

My eyes and ears were panoraht here in Wichita, where the unendingneeds met the reinterpretation of ed the decimated Native populations Entertain over the heartland’s minds and landscapes

Too bad I didn’t have a venue to report anyed his head under the loosely curled hand at reed within the post–Millennium Revelation world, or he wanted a puppy biscuit

RIC WAS COUNTING on irl bit and filled theh the "dazzle" phase

The Wizard of Oz, known for its spectacular Technicolor, was on my list of key black-and-white movies because it started with the classic Kansas far expanded that very year, 1939, to become the forever-future format