“I say we just wait until sundown and come back with my lock pick set. This place barely has a front door and the windows are all unlocked. There can’t possibly be a security system.” Griff sized up the smallest courthouse T had ever seen.

“Let’s just go in and see what we’re up against. I want to get a feel of the clerk. Then we’ll come back tonight.”

“All right, fine, but if we go in now and then come back later and they eventually figure out someone was in there who do you think they’ll come looking for? I’m not doing anything that might get Triple A in trouble. We spent too much time in the bar with him and Natalie. People saw us.”

“Yeah, maybe. My gut says we should go in now and see if we can’t make friends with someone in there. Tonight feels a little iffy to me.”

“Do I need to remind you how fucking many times A’s bailed us out? He’s got a good thing going on in this town, if that’s what this is. I’m not fucking it up for him.”

“Oh, my lands, T-Byrd, is that really you?” The screech T had spent the last six months trying to erase from his memory clawed through the air.

“Shit.”

“Looks like you already have friends in town, T,” Griff huffed. He made no effort to hide his irritation. “Who the hell is she?”

A half-breath later, Cheryl something-or-another was upon them. “Did you change your number? I call, and call, and call and never get through. I mean I know you got moved to Anchorage but I figure we can just keep in touch until you move back.”

T forced a pained smile. Griff rolled his eyes.

“I won’t be moving back. Anchorage is a permanent assignment. I’m just here to see an old friend.” An idea sprang to T’s mind. This is why he always went with his gut. He came up with his best ideas when his balls were to the wall.

As he recalled the claw marks Cheryl had left up and down his back he remembered why he’d ever put up with that voice of hers.

“Who?” Cheryl pouted. “I thought you didn’t know anyone out here except me.”

Bile swam in T’s gut. “Natalie Camden. We go way back. Do you know her?”

Griff eyed him cautiously. He shook his head but T knew he wished he’d come up with the idea himself.

When a woman like Cheryl thought they were in some kind of competition with another woman they always came out swinging. And in the dressing down she was sure to offer, there would be information they could use.

“Oh, well, yeah everyone knows Natalie. If you ask me she should spend more time at the beauty parlor than on that horse of hers. With money like the Camdens have surely she could do something about her looks. Besides she’s kind of a bitch. My mama had me invite her to a cosmetics and skin care party a few years ago. I told her she wasn’t all that ugly and that makeup would do a lot for her. She told me she’d rather gouge her own eyes out with a stick and that I could…well that’s not for polite company.

“Oh, and I heard she’s taken up with that no good bartender at Saddleback’s. If you ask me he has more tattoos than good sense. I mean, where did he even come from? My mama says he’s not to be trusted and I agree. Leave it to the Camdens to go around befriending all of the wrong kinds of people. Have you ever met Austin’s wife? Met her on the rodeo circuit, so he said. I went over there one time to ask Austin about something and you would’ve thought I set fire to their barn. She was all over me. Told me Austin was taken, like I didn’t know that. I was there to congratulate him on all of his rodeo winnings. Some people.”

Griff rubbed his temples. “Seriously, her?” he mouthed behind Cheryl’s back.

So she went after Austin Camden, one of the brothers, T recalled from his digging, after he’d won the PBR buckle and all of the money that went with that, and Austin’s wife had called her on it. T only knew what the Camden family looked like on paper, but from what he’d heard he’d say he liked them.

“Get rid of her,” Griff demanded silently. He glanced toward the street where they were drawing a small but interested crowd.

“Listen Cheryl, we’re heading out. We’re leaving for Anchorage tonight. It’ll be a long trip. It was nice to see you.” One of the many things he’d learned in special ops training was how to lie. That had served him well.

“Well, at least give me your new number so we can keep in touch. You still own that business you were telling me about. It sounded so lucrative and exciting.”

T never told anyone outside the agency what he actually did for a living. He searched his mind for exactly which story he’d told Cheryl.

“Company went bankrupt,” Griff explained. “He lost everything. Can’t get a job doing anything but working the pipelines in Alaska. Rough work. No money. He’s got nothing to show for it but debt.” He slapped T on the back consolingly. Okay, so T wasn’t the only one who occasionally came up with brilliant ideas.

“Oh.” Cheryl took two steps backward and T almost laughed out loud. “Well… uh… it was nice to see you.” She ran away from them like they’d suggested she go back to Camden Ranch and take on Mrs. Austin Camden again.

“Okay, I owe you one,” T sighed.

“Oh, dude, you owe me more than one. What the hell? Did you sleep with her?”

“I was hard up.”

“You see the statue of the cowboy on the horse right there?” He pointed to the small concrete statue in front of the courthouse. “Even he is not hard up enough to go there. Now, since someone in this town besides Triple A knows your name, we’re gonna go get lost until tonight when we can come back and do this right, fucker.”

“Yeah, all right. Where the hell do you get lost in a town like this?”

“Let’s take a drive and figure out what we can see of Camden ranch.”

T’s phone rang while they drove past the Camden’s land. It extended on for miles. “Biggest cattle ranch I’ve seen in a while,” he commented before taking the call. “Talk to me, Mad-Dog.”

“Two hundred and fifty acre farm of sorts. Nothing on it but wheatgrass. They’ve got it leased to Orpington Cattle for the moment and a feedlot management company in town is managing it. Nothing out of the ordinary. Lease agreement says the Camdens have owned it for the past twenty-five years. There’s been no changes in ownership or any sign that they sold any of it off or purchased more. Sorry, T. Looks like this is a dead end.”

“Marking something off the list isn’t a bad thing. Easier for me to figure this out if it’s up here anyhow. Triple A says to thank you for your help. That goes for me, too.”

“No problem. How’s he doing?”

“He’s got it bad for a cowgirl. If he doesn’t fuck this up you might get a wedding invite sometime.”

“Oh, yeah? Good for him. He deserves something good in this life. Tell him to give me a call sometime.”

“Will do.” He ended the call. “Got nothing to do with the land in Oklahoma.”

“I figured,” Griff sighed. “If land changed hands records of it have to be in that courthouse.”

“What time do you figure everyone in this town goes to sleep?”

“Well, you gotta give Junior time to do his chores and his homework then there’ll be some top ten rides or some other shit everyone’ll watch on the PBR network assuming the satellite signals don’t give out ’cause we’re out here in Bumblefuck. God, I do not miss this,” Griff spat with far more anger than was necessary.

T loved growing up on a ranch. The wide open prairies of Camden Ranch made him long to turn down the gravel road and baptize himself in the sanctuary of it all. Hell, he’d even shovel manure if they’d just let him stay for a day or two. Griff hadn’t fared as well. He still held a grudge.

“Want to have a conversation with me that we’ll swear we never had?” T hoped he’d agree. This had been eating at him ever since they’d seen Cheryl.

“Is it gonna be about how fucking gorgeous Natalie is and how jealous Cheryl is and why women do shit like that?”

“Yeah.”

“We got nothing to burn but time. Why not?”

“She’s pretty, right?”

“She ain’t my type but she’s all kinds of Triple A’s. You see her ass? Damn. This town wants to build a sculpture and put it in front of the courthouse that’s what they ought to show off.”

“You know they get that way from riding.”

“Guess the country does have something going for it.”

“A’s always liked ’em small with an ass men would donate a nut just to see.”

“Well, he got it all then. She’s gorgeous and more importantly she’s smart and sweet and all kinds of into him. Cheryl’s a gold digger with three functioning brain cells and they’re all squealing give me mon-eee. I’m done with this conversation now. A’s in love with her. That’s all I need to know.”

T chuckled. “Yeah, all right.”

By ten o’clock, the honkytonk where Aaron worked was the only thing open. The rest of the main thoroughfare through town was dark and empty.

“Let’s park at the bar, keep to the shadows, and see what we find,” Griff commanded.

T parked behind the bar. “Wonder where A and Natalie are tonight?”

“His bed if he’s got any sense left.”

“Oh, come on Griff. How have you not figured this out yet?”

“Figured what out?”

“Whatever this guy did to her scared her badly enough to be afraid of men. That’s part of why A wants this guy dead instead of just mangled but breathing. I’ll bet you a Benjamin he hasn’t gotten her in his bed yet. He’d never want to scare her more.”

“Poor kid. Now I want him dead, too. At first I just wanted to beat the shit out of him because A didn’t like him. I didn’t know what he did was that bad. Sick bastard.”

T-Byrd nodded. “So, let’s go find this shitwhistle.”

“Yes, sir.”