A part of Becca still wanted to stand under a stream of the hottest water possible until she felt cleansed. But soap and water wouldn’t wash away the memory. Only putting the people responsible behind bars would help.
Teeth brushed, hair pulled back into a ponytail, Becca started for the kitchen.
Mee-Maw glanced up from the pot she was stirring and did a double-take. “Child, you didn’t have to get up. You could have slept on. But since you’re up and dressed, you might as well come get you some of these grits.” She banged the spoon on the rim of the pot and covered it with a lid.
Becca helped herself to a cup of steaming coffee and a plate of grits and bacon. As she found her chair—amazing, she already thought of this place at the table as her chair—Mee-Maw added, “I’ll fry you an egg, too—won’t take but a minute.”
“No, ma’am. This is fine, thank you.”
“I was planning on making some cream biscuits, but I just slept too late this morning. Guess we all had a night of it. ’Specially you.”
Ryan settled beside her, his own plate loaded down. “I put some toast on, Mee-Maw. C’mon, dip your plate and rest. I’ll get the toast when it’s done.” To Becca he said, “Did the phone ringing in here wake you?”
“Phone?”
“Yeah. Your dad called. He was checking on you. Sounds fierce.”
“He was in the marines. Pulled two tours in Vietnam. So, yeah, he is pretty fierce.”
“I told him you were sleeping. He was worried when he couldn’t get you on your cell phone.”
“I—I’ll call him after breakfast.”
They ate in silence for a few moments. Becca stewed over the coming phone call and hoped it would go better than the previous night’s conversation.
“I sure appreciate you letting me stay here last night.”
Mee-Maw and Ryan made aw-shucks noises. Becca put up a hand. “No, really. I was—I was in such a state that I don’t know what I would have done.”
“’Tain’t right, what happened to you. I hope they find whoever the garbage is and string him up,” Mee-Maw said.
“I’d like to help out here a little today. Whatever you guys think I can do.”
“You don’t have to, Becca,” Ryan told her. “Trust me, I was glad to do what little I did last night for you. Don’t you need to rest?”
She shook her head decisively. “No. I think I need to be busy. I want to talk to my dad, but for today… Well, I think maybe the best thing is just to lay low. I certainly poked some sort of hornet’s nest yesterday to get that kind of reaction. What I need to do is figure out exactly what I did to…well…”
“What did you find out yesterday? I never got a chance to talk with you about it last night.”
No, but we did something else. The memory of his kiss came back full throttle, stirring up a slew of butterflies in her stomach. She was glad that the attacker had not destroyed the pleasure of that kiss.
Ryan must have realized what she was thinking, because his expression turned sheepish. Then he grinned.
“I’m mighty curious, too,” Mee-Maw interjected.
Becca gave them a quick rundown of what she’d learned from Jake Wilkes and Antonio. “I don’t know whether Antonio has any answers for me, but I’ll need to go back and see him.”
“You shouldn’t go alone. I’ll go with you.”
Becca didn’t protest Ryan’s offer. She was hoping his protective mode would continue and he’d agree to help her with the project she wanted to tackle after sundown.
“I think, if you guys don’t mind, I’ll go call my dad now.” She stood with her plate and took it to the sink.
“Just leave it, Becca. I’ll get it.”
“No, ma’am. It won’t take a minute.” As Becca scrubbed the plate, she glanced out the window at the chicken coop. “Want me to collect the morning eggs for you?”
“Well…”
Becca didn’t turn and look, but she had a feeling that Mee-Maw and Ryan were holding a silent conversation behind her back.
“If you really think a little work’ll get your mind off last night, far be it from me to turn down free labor. Yes, ma’am, you can gather the eggs for me.”
Mee-Maw joined her at the sink. “Watch out for Henrietta—she’s the black one with the red chest. That gal flat refuses to lay her eggs in her nest. You’ll most likely find ’em in a corner. The scratch is by the door, but they’ll need some chicken feed, too. Don’t give ’em too much scratch, mind—won’t be long before they’re molting, and I’d like to get what eggs I can out of ’em before then.”
“Yes, ma’am. Let me just make this call and then I’ll go.”
A few minutes later, Becca sat on the bed and punched her father’s speed-dial button on her cell phone. He answered on the first ring.
“You okay?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t be on my way down there.”
“I halfway figured you already were.”
He sighed. “I started to. But…you seemed so…adamant about not wanting me there.”
“Oh, Dad.” She’d never heard him sound so wounded before, at least not about her. “It’s not that I don’t want you here. It’s that…I want to do this myself.”
“I still think these guys are too rough for you, Becca. I sent you down to what I assumed was a quiet little insurance fiddle and I forgot the cardinal rule.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s all about the money. People go crazy over money. Either they think it will pry them out of a hole or they think it will keep them from sliding into one.”
She thought about Murphy and his Early Banker decor. “Yeah. They do.”
“Tell me what you know.”
Becca gave him a more detailed report than the thumbnail sketch she’d given to Ryan and Mee-Maw. He harrumphed, asked a few pointed questions that Becca was glad she’d already thought of herself and said, “Well. You, ahem, sound like you’ve got some good leads. I like the one about the ex-con hired hand—J.T.? I haven’t found him yet, but I’m still looking.”
Her heart filled with a fragile joy. It was the first time she could remember her dad ever complimenting her.
“But listen, Becca. These people aren’t playing. They’re serious. I’m giving you three more days before I come down there. And you’d better report in twice a day—make that three. I don’t hear from you or I can’t get you on your cell phone, I’m down there like a shot. Got it?”
Becca gripped the phone. Three days. But it was more latitude than her dad had ever given her before. He was really trying to trust her instincts.
“Got it, Dad. And…thanks.”
“You trust this Ryan? If you do, be sure you take him with you. Don’t go off alone anymore. Give him my cell number in case—” Her father broke off, leaving her marveling at the completeness of his shift in perspective. When he continued, his voice was crisp to the point of harshness. “Remember—morning, noon and night reports. Don’t do anything stupid. Three days.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
EGGS COLLECTED, chickens fed, Becca grabbed a pan and joined Mee-Maw on the back porch where she was shelling peas. What she needed to do now was some serious thinking—and catch Murphy and his crew unawares after dark. If Becca were lucky, she might even manage to pry details out of the ever-evasive Mee-Maw.
The rhythmic thump of pea hulls landing in the bucket spurred Becca on to shell faster to keep up with Mee-Maw. Still, the physical labor seemed to free up her brain to think. While she shelled peas, she considered the investigation from all angles.
No, she hadn’t missed anything. She just hoped that Ryan would go along with her plans—and that Antonio’s own detective wor
k would produce a harvest. Should she risk seeing Antonio today, or give him one more day to find out what he could?
They had enough peas for lunch, put them on to cook and shelled on. Again, Becca had a moment to think. This time, though, she thought of Ryan.
The personality he’d revealed in his six months of e-mails had been consistent with the real Ryan. He may not have shared with her the fearsome battle he’d waged with either the dodder vine or the big-shot farmers like Murphy, but he had been honest and open with the things that mattered most. As his e-mails had indicated, he was a hard worker, with a sense of humor and a great big heart.
But electronic messages had failed to convey how attractive he was. Truly, it was the cherry on top as far as Becca was concerned, and maybe her own undoing.
Becca had introduced herself to the online community as a farmer’s daughter, not a private investigator. It had been a whim on her part, after lurking there for weeks. At the time, not telling Ryan what she did for a living hadn’t seemed like a big lie. After all, she’d figured, he probably was hiding things, too.
Well, he was. He could have told you about the scam, and you could have helped him solve the problem when it was little. You could have helped him go to Ag-Sure, tell them his suspicions.
So why hadn’t he? What was keeping him from going to Ag-Sure now? She knew he still kept something from her. She knew he’d been privy to conversations and plans that Murphy had done.
So why had a man so honest and so open not spoken up?
It didn’t jibe. The conspiracy had to involve family—maybe somehow Gramps had been involved.
But to Becca, what with all she’d heard about Gramps, that theory didn’t make sense, either.
Talk to me, Ryan. Tell me what is going on.
* * *
DUSTY AND TIRED from working in the fields, Ryan trudged toward the house. Last night’s lack of sleep was telling on him. If he moved any slower, he was liable to fall off the tractor. His only hope was that lunch and a rest would revive him.
But the sight that greeted him on the porch sent a surge of energy through him.
There were Mee-Maw and Becca, rocking and shelling peas together. They didn’t see him; they were deep into some conversation. The slightest of hot breezes carried Becca’s sudden trill of laughter out to him. At the sound of such music, Ryan’s throat tightened.
How could he help the one without hurting the other?
Becca spotted him then and she waved for him to join them.
He leaned against the railing to watch them. “Wow. You ladies got a lot done.”
“Yep.” Mee-Maw nailed the bucket with another long pea hull. “Who would have thought we would have had this good a crop this late in the season? Guess all those afternoon thunderstorms are really paying off, huh?”
“Not to mention those soaker hoses I ran for you. Puts the water right down where it won’t evaporate off. And you thought they’d be too newfangled.”
Mee-Maw made a face and rocked on. “I did have to oblige myself to watch out for them early on when I was hoeing. But I have to admit, they work better than the old spray sprinkler. I’ve never had a prettier pea patch. Which is a good thing, as you sure do eat a plenty of them,” Mee-Maw teased.
“Every one you cook, I’ll eat, yes, ma’am.” He shifted his weight. “Speaking of eating…what’s for lunch?”
“Dinner’s on the stove. I was just about to ring the dinner bell for you. We got peas and fried ham and some more tomatoes, and there’s some rice and onions for you. Plus, I fried some of that okra I cut yesterday. I would have batter-fried eggplant instead, but it was just too hot. Air-conditioning can barely keep up today.”
“This house needs a boatload of insulation—not to mention rewiring, replumbing and a better foundation.”
“House’ll be here when we’re long gone, young man,” Mee-Maw told him in a tart voice. “Mac built this house himself, and he didn’t cut any corners.”
Ryan exchanged a knowing glance with Becca. It felt good to have someone his age around—someone who wouldn’t fight him on small improvements like dishwashers and more energy-efficient hot-water heaters and insulation.
Mee-Maw set aside her dishpan full of shelled peas. “I know you’re itching to get back out there and I hear we may have some bad weather moving in this afternoon. So I reckon I’d better stop here and get our dinner.”
* * *
ABOUT THREE O’CLOCK, Ryan saw the first sharp spear of lightning cut through the sky. A loud boom of thunder reverberated around him.
He didn’t have to be told twice. He turned his tractor around and headed for the barn. Halfway there, hard raindrops splatted down on the tractor’s canopy. The sky was a curious gray-green that spelled trouble to Ryan’s experienced eye.
Tornadoes. Just what they needed to contend with now.
The sky suddenly darkened as if to confirm his prediction. As soon as he nosed the tractor into the safety of the barn, Ryan heard the telltale clanging of ice on the metal roof.
Sure enough, Ping-Pong-ball-sized hail rained down in sheets. He rushed for the house to find Becca and Mee-Maw yanking out tarps from a cabinet on the back porch.
“What are you doing?” he yelled over the noise of the storm.
“My tomatoes! My kitchen garden! I can’t lose it! These’ll help protect them—we’ve got to hurry!” Mee-Maw hollered back.
“Let it go! It’s not worth it!”
“No! We can do this!” Becca told him. “I’ll help you!”
Together they wrestled the tarps over the tomato vines and the rest of the garden. Ryan could see that some hail had already struck the plump tomatoes, leaving holes and gashes in them.
Hail beat into his back as he crouched down to secure the edges of the tarp with heavy bricks and rocks. He had to hand it to Becca. She hung right in there, racing for more weights to hold down her end of the tarp. They covered the little garden and made a beeline for the back porch.
“Well,” shouted Mee-Maw, “we’ve done all we can do. Let’s get out of this infernal weather.”
The lights went out a few minutes later. They sat around the kitchen table while they waited for the storm to pass and the electricity to be restored.
“I sure hope this doesn’t last past dark,” Becca muttered.
“It probably won’t. Why? Are you afraid of storms?” Ryan asked her.
“No…I had…I had something I wanted you to help me do.”
Ryan couldn’t help grinning.
She blushed. “Um, I wanted to do a little recon work. And I’d promised my dad I wouldn’t go off by myself.”
His interest was piqued now.
“What kind of recon work?”
“Remember that farmer you said had tried herbicides without any success?”
“Yeah. The kinds he used should have worked, theoretically. They’re common enough, but they’re pricey. I was going to try them, but when he told me not to bother, I didn’t see any reason to lay out capital for something like that.”
“This farmer—is he like Murphy or the other ones you’d mentioned? Tate or Oliver?”
“Hmm, I wouldn’t put him in the same class as that. He usually doesn’t pal around with Murphy. No, Martin’s always seemed on the up-and-up to me.”
“Ralph Martin?” Mee-Maw harrumphed. “Not so up-and-up. Mac rented him some land some years ago, and Ralph was mighty slow in paying him. Made all manner of excuses, but I sure saw him driving a brand-new shiny truck. Man can’t pay his bills, that’s one thing—we’ve all had hard times. But a man who won’t pay his bills?”
“I’ve not heard any talk of him being in financial trouble, though, Mee-Maw. At least not recently.” Ryan scratched his chin thoughtfully. “But
I didn’t know that he stiffed Gramps out of rent money. You’ve never mentioned it to me before.”
“He tried to stiff Mac on rent money. Your granddaddy got it eventually. As for me not bringing it up before, well… No point in bringing it up if there’s no cause to, now, is there?”
Becca broke in. “I wanted to go to Martin’s farm—see if he has any leftover herbicide. Don’t you keep leftovers?”
“Sure, if they won’t expire before you use them again. Are you saying that you don’t think he put it out?”
“Exactly. It’s been done before—one of the more common insurance fiddles is just not to spray your crops. You save money on the front end by not buying the herbicide or insecticide, and the bugs and the weeds take care of creating the disaster.”
“But I saw his men applying it. I saw the canisters on the back of his tractor with my own eyes. Mind you, now, I didn’t get close enough to see what was coming out of the sprayers. I just… Man, I took him at his word. He’s not usually cozy with Murphy and I had no reason to think…and at that point, honestly, I didn’t suspect anything.”
Becca frowned. “That vine had to gain a foothold somehow. When it was small and green it should have been killed off by whatever you put out.”
“True. Once it gets bigger, then you have to kill the host plant, which is sort of like killing the goose with the golden egg. You get rid of the problem, surely, but you have no crop remaining.”
“I’ll bet that Martin’s infestation came later, right?”
“Yeah. He swore it spread from my field and Jake Wilkes’s.”
Mee-Maw scoffed, “Right. That farm of his is six miles by way of the crow. Like that vine really jumped a state highway and hippety-hopped over to his place.”
Becca regarded Ryan for a long moment, weighing her decision to involve him in her next move. She trusted him. She knew him. And she believed him when he said he wasn’t a part of this scam.
She took the plunge. “I want to go there. Tonight. After dark. If Martin were on the up-and-up, he’d still have the containers.”
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