Margaret who? Jax texted a question mark.
marge. leasing ranch.
If his sister got any more taciturn—Jax rubbed his head. The old desert rat Evie said was wealthy—Marge. She was leasing... the ranch.Their father’s ranch?
Ergo, Marge might be the one depositing payments into the bank account that paid the property tax.
Did that make her an ally or an enemy? Wasn’t she also Donna Ortiz’s aunt? Which made Ted Swenson, what? Nephew twice removed?
Steak definitely required.
Nineteen
“Give me an anonymous city any day,”Jax declared wearily, lifting his beer bottle.
He was wearing skin-tight T-shirt and jeans, looking ready to hop on his Harley and buzz out of town at an instant’s notice.
Evie slapped a salad on the backyard picnic table. It was too hot to eat inside. Until her life flipped with Loretta’s arrival, she’d always just grabbed a salad or sandwich and sat on the porch with a pitcher of iced tea. Feeding the hordes... required more. “Anonymous—as in, no one is responsible for anyone else?”
“Exactly. I am not my brother’s keeper.” Jax eyed the salad skeptically. “No kale gave its life for this, did it?”
“It’s a chopped salad. You pay good money for this in restaurants or so I’ve been told. Eat it, and I’ll bring you garlic bread next.” She didn’t know why she was making the male idiots eat right, except that she was grateful Jax had visited the sheriff with Mavis.
“Garlic breadnow,” Roark roared, pushing away from the table and standing. “Ever’ding better wit garlic.”
“I’m cutting off the beers at two if you don’t behave,” she shouted after him as he took the stairs up to the kitchen.
Loretta snickered. “Will you send him to bed early if he sneaks another bottle?”
“I’ll leave him to sleep it off in the yard where the rabbits will eat his face.” Evie took her seat on the bench beside the kid and admired the way Reuben scarfed down his veggies. At least one of the idiots appreciated a good meal.
Jax’s steaks scented the yard. Granted, it was hard to consume greens while salivating.
“Give the dude some space,” Reuben recommended. “He didn’t blow a gasket after meeting your Miss Ward or when she suggested his nose ring was too last century.”
Evie laughed just picturing the scene. “I heard the story from Larraine already. She admires your fortitude and is delighted at how quickly you traced the trolls. And she wanted to know more about you.”
Reuben ducked his head and dug into his salad. “Not too many of us queers out here. Like attracts like.”
“And that’s why Evie doesn’t like anonymity. She likes meddling.” Jax got up to flip his steaks on the grill.
“Mostpeople need friends,” she called back at him. “Not everyone is Ironman.”
Roark loped back with a basket of hot loaves of bread. “Anonymous is lonely.”
“Agreed. But I suppose, after Jax spent the afternoon with my mother, lonely might have its appeal. I probably owe him another beer. Do we add Bernice and Geoff to our suspect list?” Evie snatched bread from the basket. “Although Bernice was probably just asking for time off, if what Dot said was true.”
“Bernice was on the list of people with keys. She could have broken in and rifled the computer,” Reuben reminded her. “Geoff was on the list, too. Half the town probably had copies. We sent you the sheriff’s file with that list.”
Evie crinkled her nose. “Try reading all that police jargon with a shop full of customers looking for magic solutions to their problems. I got as far as reading Bernice’s claims Clancy wanted her to search files, and she told him she wasn’t his secretary. I’ll try reading through it tonight. If anyone knows where the bodies are buried, she does. Still, I can’t see the motivation. Did Troy interview her?”
“You won’t read anything,” Jax corrected from the grill. “You’ll just interrogate everyone until you have what you need.”
“Shut up, Jax.” Evie forked a fresh tomato. She was not turning around to drool over his hot bod as well as his steaks.
“Bernice didn’t say more than we already know.” Reuben tore off a piece of bread. “Sheriff ain’t buying voter fraud yet, so he’s not asking the right questions. He’s like Evie, wanting to interrogate and not read that contract, even if someone went to a lot of trouble to wipe Clancy’s files.”
“We don’t know if voting machines were the reason for his death. That’s just assumption.” Returning to the table, Jax pulled off a hunk of bread. “Troy isn’t a lawyer. He won’t understand the contract’s implications until they’re spelled out. He may have someone on it. He’s keeping an open mind. We’re not.” He sampled the bread. “Not bad.”