Page 43 of Three-Inch Teeth

“So I’m not getting any more dogs,” Bottom said.

As they passed by Sheridan’s car, Bottom peered inside and saw the peregrine and asked, “You can do all this with only one falcon?”

“I left the others in town,” she said. “I’ll bring out as many as I need.”

“Where are you staying?” he asked.

“The Alpine.”

Bottom grimaced at the name. “That man doesn’t like me. Plus, he’s a gossip. I’d suggest you steer clear of him.”

Sheridan nodded, more to acknowledge her client’s advice than to abide by it.

“And I see you met Katy,” Bottom said as they neared the barn.

“If Katy is the woman who slammed the door on me, then yes, I met her.” Then: “I’m sorry. Is she your mother?”

Bottom chuckled. “No, she’s not my mother, but she’s been with the family for over forty years. Katy Cotton. Can you believe she’s seventy-six years old? And yes, she can get a little cantankerous, especially with strangers.”

Sheridan bit her lip, not wanting to say more. Especially about the odd feeling of familiarity she couldn’t shake.

*

“I’VE OWNED THIS ranch for three years, but this is the first time I’ve spent much time on it,” Bottom said, sweeping his arm around to indicate the whole of it. “It’s one thing to visit for a couple of weeks in the summer, and a whole other thing to actually live here. This ranch is aptly named.”

“Where did you come from?” Sheridan asked.

“Michigan,” Bottom said. He spit out the word. “My whole family is from Michigan, multiple generations of us. But when our governor locked us down because of COVID and decided we couldn’t buy garden supplies—garden supplies—I knew I’d had enough. I looked to find a place in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, or Colorado where I could feel free again, and I bought the first place my broker showed me: the Never Summer Ranch. Before that, I’d never even heard of Walden or Jackson County.”

“Interesting,” Sheridan said. And familiar, she thought. “What did you do back in Michigan?”

He smiled and said, “My family owns a multilevel marketing company. Have you ever heard of Bottom Balm?”

“I think I have.”

“Or maybe Bottom Shampoo, Bottom Soap, or Bottom Sunscreen? That’s us. No one ever forgets that name, is what we always told our sales associates.”

“I kind of thought it was a joke,” Sheridan said.

“It was,” Bottom said. “But it worked. And when my parents decided to retire, Bottom, Inc. went to us kids—my brother, my sister, and me. It got real ugly fast, and they weren’t unhappy to see me move west.

“I always wanted to be a cowboy,” Bottom said, “but it’s even better to be a rancher, you know?”

“I understand. So how does Katy fit in?”

“Katy raised me, my brother, and my sister. She was more a mom to us than our actual mother. She cooks, cleans, and looks after everything. She jumped at the chance to come with me. She had no real family ties in Michigan after her husband died five years ago, and she told me she had roots out here and wanted to get back.

“So,” Bottom said, “lucky me.”

“She doesn’t seem to be enjoying it,” Sheridan said.

Bottom laughed and said, “Maybe you just met her on a bad day.”

*

SHERIDAN HAD NEVER seen so many starlings in one structure in her life, she told Bottom. It was truly unusual to find so many problem birds packed together like that in every crevice and on every rafter. There were thousands of them, and the cacophony of noise was numbing. The floor of the barn was white with bird excrement, and the entire building smelled of it.

Sheridan had to shout to be heard. “You probably know that European starlings are an invasive species in North America.”

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