She won’t lead you wrong.”
Chase saw the sparkling light that danced in Cari’s eyes snuffed out. His mother didn’t know the rest of the story, about Dirk. “Well, I think Cari is doing just fine on her own,” Chase told his mother, hoping to mollify some of his mother’s remarks. “Besides,” he said, trying to change the topic, “Cari and I are going to be working on that plan at our offices tomorrow morning.”
“Oh, when will I know about them?” Mary asked, excited.
“As soon as we get them done,” Cari said. “It’s going to take a week or more. I’ve never worked on a ranch this size before and it’s a big consult.”
“Good,” Chase murmured, his voice a deep purr, “that means you’ll be here for a long time . . .”
Chapter Four
May 26
“Have you seen all of the ranch?” Mary wondered, giving Cari a kind look.
“No. Chase was going to show me more of it tomorrow morning.”
With a sly smile, Mary said, “I saw in your résumé that you also worked with raptor rehabilitators, too. Tell us more about that?”
“When I was going through Stanford, I joined a raptor rehabilitation group near the campus. I’ve always loved the hawks and eagles. In my summers, I went to Scotland where they have an incredible wildlife center near Roslin. They cared for all animals, not just raptors.” Cari smiled at the older woman. “Rehabilitation is a favorite of mine, and actually dovetails in with beekeeping.”
“So,” Mary said, pleased, “all things wild appeal to you?”
“Actually, yes. Over the years I continued to work with rehab groups here in the USA, wanting to establish some kind of foundation for them. In the United Kingdom, they’re very advanced in that regard, and I wanted to bring that template or blueprint over to our country.”
“That’s interesting,” Chase murmured, wiping his mouth with the white linen napkin, “because Mary hired a young woman named Jenny McClaren. Her family has created the Roslin Wildlife Center near Edinburgh. Might you have heard of her?”
Heart thudding once to underscore his question, her eyes widened. “Oh, yes, of course I know the McClaren family quite well.” Excitement tinged her tone. “I visited their facility when I was nineteen, and I’d taken the summer off to suss out Scottish raptor and wildlife centers. They had the best template of all of them.”
“Partly,” Chase said, “because their family has had five generations to create that advanced wildlife center. Did you meet Jenny?”
“No, but I met her parents, Gavina and Rory, who were very kind with their time to show me the operation of their center. Jenny, their oldest daughter, was studying at Oxford in biology, if my memory serves. Her sister, Charlotte, who was two years younger, was there and I got to meet and work with her. They’re a family-run operation and they were grooming both their daughters to someday take over.”
Mary chuckled. “Well, you’re in for a nice surprise, Cari. I flew over to Scotland to see them three years ago. I was able to convince Jenny to come over here and help us build a wildlife center on our ranch, based upon their blueprints for Roslin.”
“Oh, my!” Cari said, suddenly excited. “I didn’t know this!”
Chuckling, Chase said, “Mary has, over the years, expanded our ranch in many directions, and all of them good. Jenny came over to supervise the building of our facility, Silver Creek Wildlife Center. She’s quite well connected to the major raptor associations all over the world, and she knew good people who we could hire to staff our facility.”
Mary reached out, patting Cari’s hand. “So you never met Jenny?”
“No . . . I didn’t. But this is amazing! Does she live here on the ranch?”
“Sure does,” Chase said. “We built her a home near the facility. While we hired contractors, we also worked with her on the kind of home she’d like to have while she was here.”
“Jenny has a five-year contract with us,” Mary said, “and then she goes back to Scotland to help run her family’s wildlife center. She has two more years on that contract. She’s helped us get a wonderful small-animal vet whose specialty is wild animals, and another who is a bird expert. Our supervisory vet, Catherine Tavish, knew Jenny, had met her at many major international veterinary meetings over the years, and she persuaded her to move out here and be supervisor over the entire facility.” Mary preened. “Our center has become the state of Wyoming’s go-to place for