Nash giggles.
Hadley brings me a plate.
Eggs scrambled. Two strips of bacon. A piece of toast with butter. A mug of coffee, black.
She sets it down in front of me.
She sits across from us with her own plate and we eat.
"Rogue."
"Yeah, partner."
Nash sets his fork down on his plate. "I had a dream about Diesel last night."
I take a sip of my coffee. "Yeah?"
"He could drive a tractor."
"He could?"
Nash nods, serious as a tax return. "Yeah. He had to use both paws on the wheel 'cause he didn't have hands, but he was real good at it. We went to the Whataburger drive-thru and he ordered."
I lean back against the bench, my elbow brushing the top of Stitch's head. "What'd he order?"
"A kid's meal. With the apple slices."
"That's a sensible order."
"And then they gave him the toy and he didn't know what to do with it 'cause he's a dog, so he gave it to me."
"That was nice of him."
"Yeah, I thought so too." Nash picks his fork back up and stabs a piece of egg, chewing while he thinks. Across the table, Hadley is watching the two of us with her coffee mug halfway to her mouth.
"Rogue?"
"Yeah, partner?"
"You think Diesel could really drive a tractor?"
I rub my jaw, considering. "Probably not. But I wouldn't put it past him."
Nash nods, like that was the answer he expected, and goes back to his eggs.
Hadley laughs quietly into her coffee mug.
I look across the table at her and our eyes lock. Neither one of us look away, and I think we both know what this is turning into.
At least, I hope she realizes it. I’ve been ready.
Nash, with a mouth full of eggs, oblivious as only a six-year-old can be, asks me if I want to throw the football with him after breakfast.
I tell him I've got a thing this morning. Maybe later.
I don’t tell him what that is, or his mother.
After breakfast, I say my goodbyes and go park my truck about forty yards inside the gate, in the live-oak shade where my outline gets broken up by branches and dappled light, and I wait.
