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Jeff McIntyre dipped his head and seemed to visibly relax somewhat, maybe because of the respect in Josh’s tone, and taking his hand back, indicated that Josh take a seat across the desk. Josh sat and the older man followed suit.
“How can I help you, son?”
“I don’t want to take up a lot of your time. But what I have to tell you is extremely important, and I hope you’ll believe what I have to say.”
“I have no reason to doubt your word, son.”
Josh was going to take that as an olive branch, and he believed it meant that Mr. McIntyre wasn’t going to blame him for his father’s sins. Josh cleared his throat and met the other man’s eyes. “Thank you for that, sir.” He firmed his lips. “It’s come to my attention that Jesse Whitaker has been working here on the Bar M.”
The other man’s eyes narrowed. “That’s true.”
“I don’t believe it’s a situation that you should allow to continue.” Josh concentrated on breathing evenly and holding the other man’s eyes. He fully expected that the older man might pull a rifle on him at any given moment … and probably would as soon as the name ‘Hannah’ came from Josh’s lips.
“Why do you say that?”
Josh managed to keep his voice even as he answered, “He’s not a good person and he can’t be trusted.”
“You think he’s going to rustle my stock? Steal my implements?” Jeff McIntyre asked shortly.
“No, sir. He’s not a thief, not that I know of,” Josh answered as neutrally as he could manage.
“So how is he not trustworthy?”
“He’s a threat to your step-daughter.”
The older man’s eyes narrowed on him and became piercing as his scowl deepened. “Hannah?”
“Yes, sir.”
“First of all … you mean my daughter, don’t you? Hannah is my daughter.”
Shit. Josh had fucked up already and insulted the man. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry.”
“What do you know about Hannah?” An unmistakable edge had entered the older man’s voice and Josh didn’t fail to recognize it.
“Nothing much … Ty Anderson is a friend of mine. Ava is his sister and I saw Hannah at the Andersons’ house last night.” That was all true, even if Josh was leaving out parts that he knew would get him shot if the other man knew about them.
“And?”
“She mentioned Jesse was working for you,” Josh replied.
“You got some interest in my daughter you’re not letting on about? She’s fifteen, Turner, you realize that?”
“Yes, sir, I know how young she is. And I’ll respect that. But not everyone will. Jesse Whitaker is a scumbag, a lower than life piece of—” Josh was getting pissed just thinking about Whitaker near Hannah and he caught himself before he said something that her father might take exception to.
Except her father didn’t take exception. “Spit it out. Say what you’re thinking, so I know what I’m dealing with.”
Josh lifted his hands from where they rested on his knees and cracked his knuckles as he tried to contain the rage in his system that even Jesse’s name could induce. “He’s a piece of shit. He’s a piece of shit that doesn’t understand what the word ‘no’ means. The son-of-a-bitch has hurt girls before, and he’ll hurt girls again.” Josh narrowed his eyes and leveled his gaze on the other man. “And I’ll be goddamned if he’ll hurt Hannah.” Josh paused and took a deep breath and then added, “Sir.”
For a moment the other man was silent while he seemed to measure Josh’s conviction. “How do you know all of this?”
Josh let out a breath and sat deeper into the chair. “I can’t tell you that. But I will tell you that he’s hurt someone very, very close to me. You can speculate on who that is, and you’d probably come up with the right answer. I would appreciate it if that information doesn’t go farther than this room. I would never have told anyone that … except … I’m worried about Hannah … so worried that I’m sick to my stomach.”
Hannah’s father watched him from across his desk for a few seconds before he abruptly stood to his feet. Josh did the same and they walked out of the study and over to the front door where Hannah’s dad turned to him. “I’ll think about what you’ve said, and you can be sure I’ll take care of my own. You’ve never personally done anything to hurt my family, and I won’t blame you for things you can’t control. But son, I’m warning you—you best remember that my daughter is only fifteen years old, and if I catch onto anything out of line—you’ll live to regret it, understand me?”
“Yes, sir.”
Josh turned and left.
Chapter Five
Janet McIntyre waited until Josh left and then she walked up behind her husband who watched from the window and put her hand on his shoulder. “What was that all about?”
Jeff turned away from the dust still settling in his yard and faced his wife. “That boy’s worried about Hannah. Says Jesse is no good and might hurt her if he catches her alone.”
“Oh, my God. Do you think it’s true?”
“Probably. The Turner boy believes it, that’s for sure. He must really believe Jesse’s a threat to Hannah, or else he wouldn’t have come here. I could tell he knows what’s going on between his father and Cindy, and I think it took all the nerve the boy had to show his face around here. And he only did it for one reason.
“Hannah?”
“Yeah.”
“You think he has feelings for her?”
“Absolutely. I don’t know how I feel about that yet, but he’s working himself into a crazy state thinking someone might hurt her.”
“Are you sure that’s the reason and he’s not just doing a good deed?”
“No question about it. I recognize the crazed look in his eyes that says he’ll do whatever he has to do to protect the things he cares about. Yeah, I recognize the look because I see it everyday.”
“Where?”
For a moment Jeff didn’t answer, just ran his eyes over his wife’s form with extreme possession. “In the mirror.”
****
Within the hour, Jeff McIntyre was sitting in Sheriff Thompson’s office, where he had recited the story almost verbatim, only leaving out the bit about the identity of the girl who’d been attacked, and who he believed was the Turner girl, Katie.
“What do you think?” he asked the sheriff now.
“I’ve never particularly cared anything for the Whitaker kid. He’s never broken the law, though, not that I know of. I’ve got nothing to pull him in for.”
“What do you know about Josh Turner?”
“Other than his father is a lazy piece of garbage who’s in and out of my jail for disorderly conduct all the time?”
“Yeah, except that. Everyone in the county knows Chris Turner is pure shit. I’m speaking of the boy now.”
The sheriff shook his head. “Jeff … I think he’s a good kid. Maybe that’s not what you want to hear, but nothing indicates otherwise. Jimmy Clack thinks the kid is a gold mine and even trusts him with the cash register. He says the feed store hasn’t been this clean in twenty years. The boy doesn’t sit around if there aren’t any customers. He makes himself useful. He’s a hard worker.”
“What else?”
The sheriff shook his head again, looking thoughtful. “I don’t know what to tell you. You know my daughter Mandy is a senior this year as well. She says that Josh is on track to graduate second in his class. That’s pretty damn impressive.”
“Yeah,” Jeff agreed.
“This morning, I caught him—”
“Caught him what?” Jeff McIntyre cut in.
“Nothing bad, man. I saw him helping Mrs. Dawson after she dropped her purse. Everyone else just ignored her and went about their business, but not the Turner boy. And then to top it off, he loaded her groceries for her, all the while listening to her yammer. And you know how she can yammer.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“I think you’re barking up the wrong tree if you’re trying to
get something on the Turner kid. More than likely, what he’s saying about Jesse is true and he’s probably right. You need to watch out for Hannah.”
Jeff contemplated the other man for a moment. “I can easily fire Jesse and I guess I will. He’s been late three or four times already. But I still don’t like how familiar Josh seemed, talking about my daughter. She’s too young for boys to be hanging around—”
“You’re not going through anything we don’t all go through when our girls begin to grow up. Mine’s a senior, remember? I’ve wanted to take a shotgun to more than one kid. But you just can’t.”
“But it isn’t right. He’s too old for her.”
“Well, don’t look to me for answers. He hasn’t done anything wrong, and your daughter’s what, almost sixteen?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s not like I can throw him in jail. If I arrested every kid who has a younger girlfriend, three-quarters of the boys at Redwood Falls High would be in my jail. Just calm down and remember that you and Janet raised Hannah right and she’s not going to do anything she shouldn’t do. And from everything I’ve seen, no matter what kind of rocky start Josh Turner had in life, he’s a good kid. Diana and David did a damn fine job with him.”
Jeff thanked the man and left his office, wanting to get back to the ranch without delay to fire Jesse Whitaker.
****
Hannah poked her head in Ava’s room, intent on dragging some answers from her friend. Ethan had left shortly after had Josh this morning, and now Hannah couldn’t stand the curiosity anymore.
Ava was digging through her drawers and glanced up when Hannah entered. Hannah knew her mom would be here in a couple of hours to pick her up, so she had to pry the information from Ava as quickly as she could. She decided the blunt approach would be best. “I want to know what’s going on with you and Ethan.”
Ava turned to face her with a deflated sigh. “Do we have to do this right now?”
“My mom’s going to be here after while, so yeah. And we’re alone, so spill it.” Hannah plopped down on the center of the bed.
“There’s not much to tell that you didn’t see at the party last night.”
