Page 49 of Head Room

She laughed, sounding less burdened than I’d ever heard her.“Smart move.And know that you will be very popular in the two and a half minutes it takes my sons to consume them all.”

I handed over the bag with barely a twinge.

“Hannah makes cookies for your boys?”

“Hannah?No.”She looked surprised and amused.“I don’t know that she’s ever— Oh, you were at the supermarket, listening to Penny, weren’t you?If she was talking about someone making cookies for the boys, it was Irene.She did that regularly for us, for the vets, most of all for the firefighters— You know Frank was a volunteer?”

“I heard he was mostly support.”

A frown flickered.“Maybe lately, but he’s done a lot with them.”With a faint chuckle, she circled back to my original bad assumption.“When it came to baked goods, it was definitely Irene, not Hannah.”

“Of course.”I sighed.“Caught again by Penny’s pronouns.”

Glad I gave her a chuckle in return for all the time she’d given me.

****

Driving down theranch road toward the highway, I looked over at Red Sail Rock glowing in the morning sun.

Did Connie’s take on the Jardoses’ relationship with the colonel strengthen my inclination to give credence to his certainty that Frank Jardos had not committed suicide?

Yeah, probably.

Time to call the team.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Mike and Jennifereach let it be known they thought it was well past time that I’d called.

Not during that first call, when I said there might be something stirring and asked if they had time to discuss.Then, they’d each said they could talk in a few minutes, without asking many questions.

Jennifer said she was nearing a point where she could take a break for a conversation.

Mike’s flight had just landed at Cody.He’d be available to talk during his drive to Sherman.

Diana was at the station and said she’d find a private place to talk at the agreed-on time.

I debated driving back toward town, but decided that as long as I was in the area, I’d take a shot at stopping by the fire department substation in hopes of finding the guy who’d been lead on the fire Miles Stevens told me about yesterday.

No sense going there right away, then sitting outside during the conversation with the others.If Ned Irvin or anyone else was there that would almost certainly catch their attention and curiosity.Better to walk in cold, so to speak.So, I went to a turnaround spot not far from the Red Sail Ranch’s entryway, parked under a cottonwood for shade, and checked for connection.

This close to the Walterstons’ ranch I was optimistic, but I’d learned to check.

All good.

That left me time to try to put my thoughts in order.

The time to start the group video call rolled around before I completed that task.

That’s when our Chicago contingent expressed their opinions of my timing.

“Hey, Diana could have called you.Why not get on her case?”I demanded.

“You’re the one who starts these things,” Jennifer said.

“I needed to sort out my thinking about it.”

“No, you didn’t,” Diana said.