“That’s him,” Cash said, grinning.
“You need a helping hand with that coyote who’s stalking her, you just let us know,” Harley told him. “We’ll put together a posse and go hunting.”
“Not in my town, you won’t,” Cash said easily.
“Not in your town at all, Chief,” Harley agreed. “Out in the boondocks!”
Cash waved a hand at him. “Eat your sandwich and go to work, or I’ll call Cy Parks and tell him you’re ordering up lynch mobs.”
“Nope, just coffee and BLTs,” Harley said, grinning. “Miss Merrie doing okay, then?”
“She’s doing fine, thanks,” Ren replied.
“She’s a sweet girl,” Harley replied. “Drew a picture of my wife. It was so lifelike, I thought it was a photograph.”
“She’s got a rare talent,” Ren agreed.
“Tell her we all asked about her,” Harley added.
“Sure thing,” Ren replied.
Cash smiled at Barbara as she delivered his chili and coffee and Ren’s burger and fries, also with coffee.
“Thanks,” Cash said.
“Have to keep the police well fed and happy,” Barbara said, “or crime will take a toll on my profits!”
“If you want to keep me happy, go give my speech to the Rotary Club Thursday,” Cash said grimly.
“You’ll do fine.”
“I hate getting up in front of people,” Cash replied. “Life was easier ten years ago.”
“In a ghillie suit crawling through the jungle? Give me a break!” She laughed, rolling her eyes. “If you need anything else, just call.”
“Thanks.”
Ren was staring at Cash over the burger. “Ghillie suit?”
“Yes.”
Ren bit into his hamburger and washed it down with coffee. “Barton was a sniper in my unit in Iraq. He had a ghillie suit.”
“I did it for a living for a long time,” Cash replied. “So did a couple of other local residents, including one of our doctors—Carson Farwalker.”
“He was at the hospital.”
“Good man,” Cash said.
“I had two other men in my unit from here—Cag Hart and Blake Kemp.”
“Cag’s running the Hart Ranch Properties, headquartered here in Jacobsville,” Cash said. “Blake Kemp is our district attorney for the judicial circuit.”
“I heard Meredith’s sister mention Kemp. She works for him, doesn’t she?”
“Yes. She’s just started, but she’s good at her job.”
“She loves her sister.”
Cash nodded. “It was just the two of them against their father.” His face tautened as he ate. “Hell of a bad one. I wasn’t chief here when the girls were young. If I had been, he’d have been occupying a cell in my jail, and I wouldn’t have given a damn how much money he had.”
“Meredith told me some of it,” Ren said quietly. “She’s had a hard life.”
“They both have. But with the old man gone, a little sunshine’s filtering through. Especially for Sari,” he added with a smile. “She and Paul had a hard road to the altar. She wouldn’t speak to him when he first came back here. So he picked her up and carried her out to the car and talked to her there.”
Ren chuckled. “A determined man.”
“One of the best people in law enforcement. His whole family’s on the wrong side of the law.”
“Mikey.”
Cash’s eyebrows arched.
Ren shrugged. “I was a company commander in Iraq. Mikey was in my unit. So were Barton and Rogers.”
“It’s a small world.”
“Very.” Ren sipped coffee.
“Did you hear that they picked up the truck driver in Houston this morning, and that he’s already dead?” Cash asked.
Ren nodded. “Mikey told us.”
“Somebody offed him in his own cell,” Cash said. “They think he was given something that caused an asthma attack. A doctor hit him with a syringe of epinephrine in his heart.”
“He had a rhythm disorder.”
“He did,” Cash remarked. “My secretary, Carson Farwalker’s wife, has asthma. Luckily she doesn’t have the rhythm problem. But I did learn what you don’t do for asthma if you do have a rhythm disorder.”
“So the killer’s dead. I don’t suppose he knew anything that would help catch the real killer,” Ren continued. “We know who he’s after. And that he’ll probably be on his way back down here pretty soon.”
“We have plenty of security,” Cash reminded him.
Ren looked him in the eye. “So did JFK.”
Cash sighed. “Well, it’s unfortunately true that if a man’s willing to trade his life for yours, there’s no surefire way to stop him.”
“What we’re hoping is that he doesn’t want to trade his life for Meredith’s,” Ren replied. “If he was suicidal, he’d have died long before now.”
“Good point.”
Ren finished his burger and fries and his coffee. “I’m going back to the hospital, now that I have at least a change of clothing,” he said, laughing softly. “I didn’t even stop to pack a bag when I found out about Meredith’s accident.”
“That will win you points with her people,” Cash said with a smile.
“It did. Nice talking with you.”
“I’ll be over later to see how she’s doing.”
“I’ll tell them.”
*