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“And you thought that was the whole of it.”
“I did, yes.”
“Baby? We cleared the table and loaded the dishwasher. A fresh pot of coffee is on, and the cups and things are out.” Kevin came down the steps and stood on the other side of Maggie.
They must be expecting other company. “Thanks for making my folks feel so welcome. I’ll just get out of your way—”
“You can’t go yet,” Maggie said that before Jenny could even finish her sentence.
“I can’t?” Jenny turned so she was facing Maggie.
“No, you can’t,” Trey said as he joined them on the sidewalk. “We just put out a big plate of Aunt Anna’s cookies.”
“Cookies?”
“Yup. Cookies and coffee. The fuel of the best war councils.” Rick stood on the porch above them.
“War council?” She knew for certain right then and there, that there must have been something in the air or the water or the soil or, heck, maybe all three, after all! If she saw a plate of cookies with a sign that read “Eat me,” she was not going to do it. Nope, uh-uh, not at all. No way. She was already down the rabbit hole because she had no idea what these people were talking about.
“Yes, war council,” Kevin said. “And here comes yours, now.”
Jenny looked up and encountered what, for Lusty, would be considered a case of heavy traffic. She recognized Parker and Dale’s truck. They brought up the rear. Within barely a minute, that line of vehicles came to a stop. There were Montana Benedicts and Texas Benedicts, as well as Kendalls and Jessops and even a Jones or two.
“A war council?” Jenny thought the words bore repeating.
Sheriff Kendall, who’d parked beside the curb a few doors down, was only steps away and clearly having heard her, nodded a greeting and then he smiled. “Think of it as more of a strategy session.” He turned and looked over his shoulder. “Isn’t that right, Jake?”
Jenny hadn’t noticed Jake Kendall. He was a lawyer, and the man who’d set her up with the apartment she loved so well. And then her eyes widened when she saw who Parker and Dale had with them.
She’d only spoken to Mrs. Benedict a few times, when she’d come into the roadhouse for lunch. Jenny could only gape when the woman walked right up to her and gave her a hug.
“Don’t you worry, sweet girl. We have everything under control.” Then she slipped her arm around her and turned her toward the porch. With surprising strength, the woman everyone called Grandma Kate propelled her up the steps and back into the dining room of the Parkview Inn.
“You sit right here, between me and Parker.” Grandma Kate’s word was law because everyone had waited to see where she’d choose to sit. Once Jenny was settled, with Kate Benedict on her right and Parker on her left, Kate nodded and patted her hand.
“There were those, not so long ago, who wanted to make Lusty a gated community. This was something we could have easily done because we own all the land around the town, and the road going through is, in fact, a private road.”
Kate looked around the table. She smiled at all those assembled. Now that she was sitting Jenny realized how many people there were. Jackson and Jesse and Trace appeared to represent the newly repatriated Montanans. Jake and Adam, Josh, along with Maggie and her husbands, these were men Jenny knew fairly well—Kendalls and Benedicts born and raised in Lusty. Chance and Logan, Benedicts originally from New York and married to her friend and coworker, Bailey, were there. Paul Jessop and his wife, Kat Lawson Jessop, Jenny didn’t know as well because they spent half their time in Los Angeles, where Paul and Kat’s other husbands, Lucas and Wesley, were successful screenwriters. Kat used to be a bounty hunter but now was a private investigator.
Also present were Addison Jones-Jessop and her husbands, Mike and Terry.
“I personally didn’t want to see Lusty turned into an enclave, and so we came up with another plan. The town trust made the decision that anyone wishing to move to Lusty was welcome—but before they moved into town, we’d have a background check conducted.”
“We’ve had a few bad incidents in the last decade,” Sheriff Kendall said.
