Cowboy Strong. Stacy Finz
enough leftovers to last the week. Not such a bad deal. He considered calling his mother and getting her take on Gina’s situation, but it would probably be hopeless. Dalton and Associates had a strict confidentiality policy when it came to their clients, as they should.
Instead, he went over the notes he’d taken from interviewing a woman who’d lived on the commune with Angie in New Mexico to see if he’d missed anything.
Five years ago, his sister, Angela, had dropped off the edge of the earth. Angie had always been unreliable, jumping on every cause known to mankind, joining up with fringe groups and traveling to remote areas, living a nomad’s life. High-risk? Maybe. But his sister lived by her own rules. It wasn’t uncommon for her to disappear for a while, then reemerge a few months later.
But not this time. This time, she’d completely ghosted them, which was so out of character for her that they’d assumed something terrible had happened.
He and his parents had filed missing person reports, hired private investigators, and offered large monetary rewards for any information that would unravel the mystery, without any success.
Then, a few months ago, Sawyer had gotten good information that Angie had been living on a commune in Taos, New Mexico. He continued to plumb the lead but so far had come up dry.
In June, he’d met a woman from the commune who was now living in Santa Fe. But she’d been reticent to talk. It was almost as if she was afraid of something or somebody. She’d been visibly uncomfortable throughout the entire interview, which told Sawyer she knew more than she was saying.
He was considering taking another stab at her, but had a sinking feeling it was hopeless.
He’d lost count of how many times he or his parents had dropped everything to hop on a plane or get in a car and chase down another fruitless tip.
“Hey,” came Jace’s voice from the bottom of the stairs. “Anyone home?”
“Come up.” Sawyer quickly flipped his reporter’s notebook closed. His cousins were of the opinion that Sawyer should stop turning his life upside down every time a private investigator found a trail to follow.
But it was his baby sister, for God’s sake.
A few seconds later, Jace joined Sawyer at the dining room table. “Damn, it smells good in here.”
“Chef Boyardee was over to cook.”
“Chef Boyardee is welcome at my house anytime,” Jace said while sniffing his way to the inside of Sawyer’s refrigerator. “This it?” He held up a covered glass dish with the leftover lamb.
“Yep. You want me to nuke some for you in the microwave?” Sawyer went into the kitchen and made Jace up a plate. “What’re you doing home so early?”
“That’s what I came to talk to you about. I’ve got an interview with what may be our first tenants. Two UC Davis grads who want to lease land to grow and start up a flower stand. Charlie’s sister hooked them up with us. You remember Allison?”
“The one who owns a nursery in Portland, right?” Jace nodded. “How much land do these Davis grads want?”
Jace stood sentry by the microwave as if hovering would make the food heat quicker. “A few acres.”
“A few acres would feed a cow and her calf for a season. That’s money in the bank.” In the scheme of things, 500 acres wasn’t all that much land to run a profitable cattle operation and to lease even a small parcel might not be cost-effective.
“I hear ya. We’ll definitely have to make it worth our while financially, otherwise it’s a lose-lose.”
“How much water will they need?” Water was as precious a commodity as land.
“Don’t know yet. These are questions we need to ask them. But I like that it’ll at least be agricultural. They’re hoping to do flowers for weddings and parties. Also sell to the public. I don’t know how that’ll work. Something else to ask them. But Charlie and Aubrey like the idea. I’m meeting with them in thirty minutes at the girls’ studio. Came by to see if you want to tag along. Cash is in Plumas County today at a cattlemen’s meeting.”
“Sure, I’ll go.” Sawyer had put in a solid three hours of work after they’d moved the herd and before Gina had shown up.
The microwave dinged and Sawyer took out the plate of lamb and couscous. He got out the chickpea salad, added a scoop, and slid it down the counter to Jace. “Bon appétit.”
Jace didn’t waste any time shoveling the food into his mouth. “Wow, this is fantastic,” he said around a mouthful.
“When was the last time you ate?”
“Lunch at the coffee shop.” Jace ate there at least five times a week. They all did. “I thought you didn’t like her.”
“Who, Gina?” Sawyer hitched his shoulders. “She feeds me. I don’t have to like her.”
Jace pointed his fork at Sawyer. “The question is, Why does she feed you?” And then the moron grinned like he was really onto something.
“It’s a trade for my kitchen. She doesn’t like hers and she doesn’t like me, either.” Apparently she liked Danny Clay’s dick, though. “And after today I’m pretty sure she’s going to be here forever.”
“Why’s that?” Jace got up, found a loaf of bread in the fridge, and sopped up some of the lamb sauce with a slice.
“Someone got ahold of her and that other celebrity chef’s sext messages and plastered them all over the internet. Let’s just say they’re better than anything you get on Pornhub.”
Jace’s brows winged up. “I suppose sex texts don’t jibe with FoodFlicks’ family-friendly image.”
“Yeah, not even close. I doubt her sponsors are too thrilled.”
“She can’t hide here forever.” Jace scraped his plate clean and stuck it in the dishwasher.
“Let’s hope not.” Though if Sawyer was being truly honest, he hadn’t altogether minded her company. She had a quick wit and was fun to spar with.
“You ready to go?”
They hiked across the field to Charlie and Aubrey’s old barn. Whether on foot or horseback, Sawyer never grew tired of the place. The sights and smells changed with the hours. He loved every inch of the land, its rugged hills and rolling pastures and the way they stretched out forever, making everything else seem small in comparison. Most of all, though, he loved the way his family’s history was steeped in these foothills.
He and Jace caught up with the creek, which wound its way through the property like a snake. Maybe tomorrow he’d sit by the water’s edge with his laptop and do a little writing outdoors, then take a dip. The most popular spot was a swimming hole next to Cash’s old cabin where the water was deep and the current calm.
But now with Gina living there he planned to avoid the place like the Ebola virus. As much as he appreciated dueling with her, he didn’t want to get sucked into her drama. Not like he had this afternoon. Sure, he’d brought some of it on himself by asking a lot of questions. He tried to chalk it up to the fact that he was a journalist, naturally inquisitive—but that wasn’t completely true.
For whatever reason he was drawn to her, which was an anomaly. While his parents were fixers, he’d never had a knight-in-shining-armor complex. In general, he steered clear of women with a lot of baggage.
“What are you so quiet about?” Jace asked as they got closer.
“Just working out a story in my head and trying to figure out the hook.”
There was a 1950 candy-apple red Chevrolet pickup parked next to the barn. Sawyer wasn’t an expert on classic cars, but someone had taken real good care of that baby.
Jace let out a long, low whistle “I