make sure Hope was okay and the rustlers were behind bars.
Finding out the rustlers’ identities had been shocking. Jack had gone to school with J.B. Gatlin. He and his brother had never been anything but law-abiding people, but Jack had heard they’d fallen on hard times after their mother, Beulah, died. It appeared they’d taken the easy way out to recoup their losses.
The ER was busy by the time he arrived, so Jack didn’t do much more than check Hope out, give her a hug, and praise her for being so observant.
“You get off work at 4:00 p.m., right?” he asked.
“Yes. Shift will change at three, but it’ll take every bit of an hour before I can get away from here,” Hope said.
“So how about I pick up something for dinner and take it home. We have all kinds of stuff to make side dishes. I just thought it would save a lot of fuss and mess if we weren’t cooking some kind of meat. Does anything sound good to you?”
Hope laughed. “Everything sounds good. I’m going to have to be careful and not eat my way through the next seven months. I know…get some ribs from Granny’s, and if there’s any of Mercy’s chocolate pie left, bring me a piece.”
“Will do,” Jack said, then gave her a quick kiss and left.
Hope sighed as she watched him go. “Best husband ever,” she muttered, and then went back to work.
* * *
By nightfall, Hope Talbot was the talk of the town, and as it always was with gossip in Blessings, the story had morphed from Hope seeing the bloody boot prints and putting two and two together to being the one who’d put the cuffs on Moses Gatlin herself.
When Duke finally realized Jack had left him a voicemail, he listened to it on his way back home and was shocked by what he heard, but even more so at learning the identity of the men who’d stolen their cattle. Like Jack, it sickened him to think it had been their own neighbors who’d done it.
When he finally reached the house, he parked at the back entrance as he always did, then sat for a few moments, contemplating the facts of what he was about to do.
He had never lived anywhere else in his life but on this property, in this house, and he felt a twinge of sadness that things were going to change.
But he wouldn’t deny for a moment that this change was all for the better. On a phone call to Rhonda Bailey earlier, she had confirmed that they were already thinking of putting their old place up for sale, and they would certainly give him the first option. They were having the property appraised, and once they did, they would let Duke know what the family wanted to ask for the property.
He’d asked permission to go through it, and she told him where they’d hidden the key. That’s where he’d been when Jack was trying to call him—walking through the rooms and checking out the structure and the floors and the roof.
The bones of the old house were sound, and most everything inside was in good to decent condition, but it was all out of date and needed remodeling. If everything went as planned, he was going to make Rhonda Bailey a fair offer on behalf of her father, and he was guessing they would gladly accept it. Her father’s nursing-home care was costly.
Finally, Duke got out of the truck and went inside. He was thinking about what kind of meat to take out of the freezer to make for their supper when Jack got home. When he saw Jack carrying in a sack from Granny’s Country Kitchen, and then he smelled the aroma, he smiled.
“I see you cooked supper tonight, via Granny’s,” Duke said.
“Hope wanted ribs from Granny’s and a piece of Mercy’s chocolate pie,” Jack said.
“So do I. I hope you brought enough for all of us,” Duke said.
Jack laughed. “You know I did, so stop worrying. Hope should be here around four thirty or so. I’m going to put the ribs in the warming oven and the pie in the fridge.”
“Sorry I didn’t get your call earlier,” Duke said, as Jack began putting away the food.
“Yeah, where were you?” Jack asked.
“Over at the old Bailey place. I’d already walked the land, and I wanted to go through the house, too. Rhonda said the family is going to put the house up for sale, and I