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Sometimes? Cooper had butted heads with Treyton since they were kids. Since returning to the river basin a some months ago, he’d warned his father about Treyton having been seen talking with one of the methane company bosses. He’d also told him about catching Treyton at the real estate office in town, possibly seeing what the ranch might be worth on the open market.
His brother always seemed to be angry, wanting their father to step aside and let him take over the ranch, convinced he could run it better. Cooper feared what Treyton would do if he got the chance.
“You’re headed out to Oregon, right?” Holden asked. “Taking Tilly with you?” He smiled. “Make it a nice little holiday. No reason to rush back.” As if thinking the same thing Cooper was, his father asked, “Any word on when Charlotte is coming back?”
He shook his head. “As far as I know she hasn’t been in communication with anyone here. I don’t think CJ is healing as she’d hoped. Doubt she wants to return until he is.”
His father sighed. “Charlotte hates to lose, but from what I’ve heard, CJ will be coming home in a wheelchair. How long he might be in one, possibly the rest of his life, is debatable. If she has anything to do with it, he’ll walk again.” Charlotte Stafford’s iron will was legendary. “Does she know about the engagement yet?”
“Not that I know of,” Cooper said. “Tilly hasn’t heard from her. But the fact that her mother hasn’t been taking her calls could be an indication that Charlottehasheard.” He saw his father frown. They both feared how Charlotte would take it.
As for CJ Stafford, he and his father felt the same way about the cowboy who had almost killed both of his sisters. Cooper was hoping CJ walked again for personal reasons. He needed to settle a few things with him.
“I’m sure you’ve heard,” Cooper said. “Charlotte’s lawyers are fighting to get the cases against CJ for both incidents dropped.” No one in the county who knew the Stafford matriarch believed her son would ever do any jail time.
His father said nothing. In recent years, he’d argued for peace between the families. Now he changed the subject. “Well, have a good trip. Can’t wait to see this bull when you get back. Drive safely.” Holden’s gaze shifted to something behind Cooper. “Was that Duffy leaving?”
“Said he had a date.”
His father shook his head. “I doubt he’ll ever settle down and get serious about a woman—let alone working this ranch.”
OAKLEYSHOWERED,dressed and headed for Miles City with a planned stop along the way to pick up her two cohorts, Duffy McKenna and Pickett Hanson. Duffy was Holden McKenna’s youngest son. Pickett had been a McKenna ranch hand since all three of them were in their teens. Both were her best friends and partners in crime and had been since then. She used to sneak over to the neighboring ranch and the three managed to get into all kinds of trouble. They still did.
Both young men had stolen a piece of her heart with their good looks, their heart-fluttering grins and outrageous senses of humor. Lately, the three of them had become even closer out of their determination to stop the coalbed methane drilling in their valley.
As she pulled up to the meeting place just outside town, the two men exited the pickup they’d arrived in and walked toward her, smiling. They were both so darned handsome, cowboys through and through. For years, Oakley had watched cowgirls throwing themselves at the two of them. She hadn’t been one of those cowgirls. She’d ignored both men when they flirted with her—and still did. It only seemed to make them both more determined to win her over.
She laughed now as the two wrestled over who was going to sit on the pickup’s bench seat next to her. They’d made a game out of trying to court her favor. “Quit horsing around. We need to get going.”
Duffy won the wrestling match, sliding in next to her, grinning and giving her a hip bump. Like all the McKennas, he had thick dark hair and incredible blue eyes with long dark lashes that made her jealous. “Hey, beautiful.”
She elbowed him in the side as Pickett climbed in, slammed the door and then got the truck moving. “Tilly told me that the sheriff mentioned to her that another drilling rig had been vandalized,” she said, getting down to business. Sheriff Stuart Layton was close to both Tilly and Cooper. Her sister had dated Stuart for a while before her true heartthrob Cooper had returned.
Oakley glanced over at the two men as she drove out of town and headed for the mountains they would cross before dropping down into the Yellowstone River Valley and Miles City. She loved both Duffy and Pickett, but lately Oakley felt as if something was changing. Or maybe it was her. “You know Stuart suspects us,” she said, keeping to the subject at hand.
“But he has to prove it was us,” Duffy said and grinned.
“I think we need to work on the ranchers,” Pickett said, always the practical one. When the three of them had built a treehouse in the woods, Duffy had been convinced it was safe enough. Pickett refused to climb up until it was supported better. Duffy broke his arm in the fall when the treehouse collapsed.
“If ranchers don’t let them drill on their land, CH4 will have to move on,” Pickett said. “Keeping them from using their drilling equipment for a few weeks isn’t stopping them.”
“Neither is trying to get ranchers not to drill,” Duffy said. “Too many of them need the money and if this drought continues...” It was no secret that Duffy enjoyed sabotaging the drilling rigs, but he really did want the drilling to stop. Like Pickett, he tended to joke around, making people think he didn’t take anything seriously. But most people didn’t know either man the way Oakley did.
“It does come down to money,” Pickett agreed. “So many of the ranches had to sell their cattle earlier than they wanted because of it, our ranches included.”
Oakley knew the argument too well. “Maybe someone will have a suggestion at this meeting in Miles City. We need to be careful, though. The sheriff is watching us. So are the folks at the methane gas company. It’s getting more dangerous.” None of them spoke until she was almost to Miles City.
“I’m not sure you should go with us to the meeting,” Pickett said.
She shot him a look that she hoped sent her clear answer to that.
“I’m serious, Oakley. You’re right about it getting more dangerous. I’m worried about you. Isn’t your mother coming back soon?”
“What does she have to do with this?” she demanded. While she planned to confront her brother, she knew her mother would fight like a mama grizzly to protect her oldest son—maybe especially if his injuries still had him in a wheelchair.
“The next well could be on your ranch,” Duffy said. “Your mother had been about to make a deal with CH4 before she left. I doubt CJ’s changed her mind.”
Oakley let out an oath, slamming her hand down on the steering wheel. “CJ,” she said. “I’m sure he talked her into it. He’d have wells all over the ranch if he had his way. All he thinks about is the money. Doesn’t care about what it will do to the ranch that our children and grandchildren will inherit.” She groused under her breath for a moment before glancing over at them. “If she goes ahead with it, we’re going to stop that well from going in.”
