Page 45 of Head Room

“...not what you’d expect to be coming here from all over.Not saying outsiders can’t fit in, because she did right off.Sad to think her kitchen’s gone even though, really, not worse than last year and all that sadness—”

That sounded like Irene Jardos...Maybe?Or—

“—don’t shake that off.Sometimes never.Enjoy yours.Bye now.”Having rung up and bagged my cookies, then taken my payment, she turned to the next person behind me, a librarian I knew to nod to.“Well, hello there...”

She was off again and the only place for me to go was out the door.Right after I picked up my two bags of backup cookies.

****

Change of plans.

From my SUV, I called the station.Nobody needed me there.Maybe that should wound my ego.On the other hand, the freedom to follow where Penny pointed soothed any ego twinge.

Especially when my call to Connie Walterston was met with an invitation to come right over.

I headed east out of town toward an area known as Red Sail Rock because, well, there was a rock that looked like a red sail.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I turned ontothe road to Red Sail Ranch, also familiarly known as the Walterston place.

Connie Walterston worked for Tom.Not on his ranching operation, but on the highway construction business his father started.In fact, she just about ran it.

Tom wasn’t all that interested in the operation, truth be told.His heart was in ranching.Between that and some other circumstances, the business wasn’t as robust as when his father retired.On the other hand, the ranch was doing far better.

Yeah, Tom and his father did not see eye-to-eye.

Except, possibly, on Connie Walterston.

She ran the highway construction company partly out of a trailer near the Circle B, when she needed to be on hand where the equipment was kept, and the rest of the time from here in her home.

This was a busy-ish time.Not as busy as when they were starting the season and not as busy as when they were racing Wyoming weather to finish projects, but busy enough.

She and her three sons also split duties running their ranch, while the sons alternated pursuing college degrees.

I saw one of them in the distance, working with irrigation equipment.Too far away to tell if it was Jaden, Kade, or Austin.

It was certainly a way to build up a hunger for cookies.

The ranch house and the area around it were modest and well-tended, rather like Connie herself.

She opened the door before I could knock, gesturing me in as she continued to listen to someone through the wireless headset she wore.

“Okay, okay.You had me at broken leg.Send me the bill when you get it and I’ll look it over for you...Sure.And if you need an advance...Good.Okay.Give her a hug for me — a gentle hug.”

She smiled at me as she took off the headset.

“Pour yourself a coffee while I set this to taking messages,” she instructed as she went to her desk and hit buttons.“One of our equipment drivers’ daughters broke her leg last night trying trick riding.She’s only nine.Good news is it’s a clean break.But he was up all night with her, still at the hospital now.We’d already worked around him, but he wanted to apologize again.”

“And you wanted him to know you’d check over the medical bills.”I lifted the coffee pot I still held and she slid the mug she’d brought to the kitchen counter under the spout for a refill.

“Got to know my way around those abominations and if I can help out...”She generously shared knowledge she’d picked up from the years her late husband had been ill.“But that’s not why you wanted to come out to see me.”

“No.Want to hear what you can tell me—” And what shewouldtell me, because she’d share a lot but not if it conflicted with higher loyalties.“—about Sergeant Frank Jardos.”

“Oh.”That came out as a stream of sorrow.“I can’t believe it.It’s just awful.Awful.I couldn’t believe it when I heard the place was on fire and then when they found...”

“Could you see it from here?”I asked to redirect her slightly.