“You don’t got to look so relieved,” Cash said.
“Shut up.” He clapped Cash on the back. “How’s it going, man? You have a good Christmas?”
“It was okay. Spent a bunch of time with the sister and her family.”
“Ah.” Yeah, Cash’s sister was kinda…famous in her own mind. When she came to a show everyone ducked for cover. She did make good green bean casserole though. “I met Dillon’s sister. She’s a decent egg.”
“Is she? Does she freak you out like the clown does?” They headed up for the house, Cash taking in everything. The man would have half the work needed done by the end of the day and Coke knew it.
“Not even a bit. You know Dallas and Houston? They’re the ones directly older than Aje.” Coke said when the boys joined them.
“Don’t worry about telling us apart. We all look like daddy.”
Cash chuckled. “Howdy, boys. What can I do to help?”
“Don’t be afraid to put this old man to work. He’s a stock contractor and he knows his way around cattle.”
“You want to come check out some of our mommas? B-35 got through the fences and we got Jurassic Park babies.”
“You bet.” Seemed like Cash was always up for dealing with cattle instead of people. He waved at Coke, then headed off with the boys.
“That was not too bad,sim?” Balta nudged his arm. “Come to nap, hmm? Everyone is busy. We can hide.”
“You’re a bad man, de Silva.”
“I am. So lazy, too.” Balta gripped his arm and dragged him along. Pansy and Jerome met them at the porch, wagging madly.
He whistled them up and they found his room, both of them kicking off their boots before settling in together, bassets acting as the world’s best heating pads.
Balta groaned. “I might need one of these dogs.”
“Mmhmm. They do a good job. I like them.” God, he hadn’t even known he was tired. His eyelids drooped, and Jerome began to snore.
“They do. Like a hot sandbag. Sleep, Coke.”
“Sleep.” He nodded, gave Balta a half grin, then let it go.
Chapter Twenty-Five
There were so many people at the Gardner ranch that no one had a job for a clown.
Dillon knew how to drive a tractor, mend fences and worm horses. Sadly, so did every asshole in the county. He could help the kids with their math homework or do the books for AJ, but really, that didn’t need to be done, either.
He could dance and sing, but that seemed inappropriate, given the gravity of the situation.
So he grabbed his laptop and his foot warmer, Pansy, and went to sit on the back porch. Time to surf.
The sun was shining, but Coke insisted there was a blue norther coming, if not tonight, then tomorrow. All the Gardners had nodded, oh so seriously, so Coke must be right.
Right now he would enjoy the sun.
He checked the bank accounts, then glanced at his sponsor’s emails. Boring.
Oh, Ancestry.com. He loved that shit.
He’d done the Walsh line back to the middle ages, so Dillon started with Coke, and found nothing. Like, absolutely nothing.Okay. Weird. A challenge! Woo.So, broader. Pharrises in Texas.
There were a bunch of them, but no one even near his age. Coke was just a year older than him—that was it.
