Janet Tronstad - A Rich Man for Dry Creek and A Hero For Dry Creek - A Rich Man For Dry Creek / A Hero For Dry Creek

“I’ll let you ask.” Jenny held out the phone. She was defeated. Why try and protect the privacy of Robert Buckwalter when he obviously wanted people all across the country to read about him as they stood in line to buy groceries? She suddenly wished she had told her sister he was hot.

Robert took the phone from Jenny’s hand.

A faint siren filtered into the barn and could be heard even over the commotion caused by the three kidnappers being tied up on the barn floor against their wishes.

“I want to negotiate,” Robert said into the phone. “Agree to my terms and we’ll talk.”

Jenny looked up. “You have terms?”

Robert nodded emphatically to Jenny as he continued speaking into the phone. “That’s right. I’ll cooperate if you cooperate. And I assure you you’ll get your story somehow.” He listened and then grinned. “Yes, something with pictures. It might take me a day or two to work it out first. Talk to the editors. See what they say.”

Jenny felt stiffer than she could remember feeling for years. Terms. He had terms. He was planning to sell his soul and become an underwear model.

Jenny almost missed the barn door opening once again. If it wasn’t for the siren growing louder and then stopping, she wouldn’t have paid much attention. But then she heard the booming voice of Sheriff Carl Wall.

“Where are they?” the sheriff demanded as he stomped into the room carrying two large suitcases.

“Careful with those.” A platinum blonde stepped daintily behind him. “Those are alligator skin cases.”

Jenny had never seen such a woman. Now there was somebody who could get away with modeling underwear. She was tall, thin and reeked of style. She was just a touch haughty and Jenny knew without a doubt that the hair color she wore was not her own.

The FBI agent seemed to share Jenny’s suspicions that the woman was not one of the locals and he walked over to the woman. “I’ll need to see some identification.”

“Identification?” The woman stopped. She managed to look very offended. “I don’t need any identification. I’m with him.”

The woman pointed at Robert Buckwalter.

Jenny saw Robert flinch. He’d quietly pressed the off button on the cell phone, hanging up on her sister. That meant that whatever was going to be said now was something that Robert wanted to be kept from the press.

This is it, Jenny braced herself. That woman spells a secret if anyone does.

“Now, Laurel, you know that’s not—”

The FBI agent appeared to have no patience. He looked at Robert. “She’s with you?”

“I wouldn’t say ‘with’—I know Laurel, of course. Our families are, well…My mother knows her better—so, no, I wouldn’t say ‘with.’”

“It was ‘with’ enough for you on Christmas!” Laurel staged a pout that would have done justice to a Hollywood starlet.

Jenny nodded to herself. Of course.

“I didn’t see you on Christmas!” Robert protested. It was colder than an Arctic winter inside this barn and he was starting to sweat. “I haven’t seen you for months!”

“Well, maybe not this Christmas,” Laurel agreed prettily. “You were a naughty boy and didn’t come to my party. And here I’d counted on you.”

Jenny started to breathe again. He hadn’t seen her for months.

“I never said I would come,” Robert said wearily.

He’d never said he would come. Jenny started to sing inside.

“Don’t worry, I forgive you. I figure we have lots and lots of Christmases to spend together.” Laurel stepped close and smiled at Robert confidently. “Laurel knows these things.”

Jenny dropped the teaspoon she held in her hand. She wondered if Laurel did know these things. If the other woman did, she was ten steps ahead of Jenny who couldn’t seem to figure out much about anything.

“B ring those bags over here.” Laurel looked behind her and spoke sharply to Sheriff Wall who was standing staring at Laurel. The sheriff looked down at his arms as though he’d forgotten they were attached to his shoulders let alone that they held two expensive bags.

Jenny looked around. The sheriff was not alone in his fascination with Laurel. The ranch hands had forgotten all about the hot coffee they’d been lining up to get. By the looks on their faces they no longer needed the coffee to warm them.

“I need my lipstick.” Laurel pouted for the benefit of the men standing around. “My lips aren’t used to weather like this.” She shivered delicately. “Why, it’s terrible out there.”

Silence greeted her pronouncement.

“It is cold at that, ma’am,” one of the ranch hands finally ventured to say.

Laurel smiled up at him. “You really should pick better weather for doing these cow things.” She turned her head so her smile hit Robert. “What is it they called it—the rustle or something?”

“Rustling,” Robert said dryly. “You’re talking about the cattle rustling that has been going on around here. A hundred thousand dollars worth of loss so far. Interstate stuff. Enough to put some of these ranchers under. The FBI is working on the case now. It’s serious here.”

“Well, they need to plan it for a warmer time of year, don’t you think?” She appealed to the sheriff who was bringing her bags to her. “Maybe you could talk to the people in charge of the rustling. Ask them to do it in the summer instead. We could have a lawn picnic then with umbrellas and iced tea.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Sheriff Wall replied automatically. He looked worried. “Where do you want me to set these bags?”

Laurel looked around, her eyes finally settling on the refreshment table.

Jenny winced. The refreshment table had looked better when the evening began. The teenagers had wrapped the legs in swirls of pink crepe paper and had twisted streamers from the table edge to the floor all along the front of the table. But those streamers were gone now, leaving stubby pieces of tape behind. And the lace tablecloth borrowed from Mrs. Hargrove had a half-dozen brown circles where some coffee cup had spilled. The punch bowl still stood in the center, even though only an inch or two of liquid remained in its bottom.

“I can’t put my bags there,” Laurel appealed to Robert. “They’re genuine alligator. They’ll get wet with that stuff.” She pointed to the punch bowl.

“If they’re alligator, I expect they’ll be fine if they get wet.” Robert shook his head. He added in disgust, “The skin’s been wet before when it was on the alligator. I can’t believe you’d buy alligator skin luggage anyway. Aren’t they some kind of endangered group or something?”

The other men were more forgiving and more eager to please. One of the ranch hands took off his vest and laid it over the tablecloth. “Here. I think your bags are beautiful. And don’t worry. You can put your bags on this. Won’t hurt my old vest any.”

“Why, aren’t you kind?” Laurel gushed at the man and then looked over at the sheriff. “You can put them there.”

The sheriff set the bags on top of the vest and then ducked his head, mumbling something about getting back to the kidnappers.

“Kidnappers?” Laurel looked up with the first genuine expression that Jenny had seen on the woman’s face yet. Laurel’s smile was gone and she looked twenty percent smarter. “I thought you said they were cattle rustlers.”

“Well, they’re also kidnappers,” the sheriff said somewhat sourly.

“Oh, dear, I knew I shouldn’t have come here to this end-of-the-world place where there aren’t even police to protect me from the criminals that run loose.”

“I’m the law around here.” The sheriff stomped a little louder than he needed to on his way over to the tangle of kidnappers that were waiting for him on the floor. “I protect all the citizens of Dry Creek.” He smiled up at Laurel. “And the visitors, too, of course. I take good care of visitors.”