Page 38 of Wind Valley

Ruth laughed giddily. “All of our men are strange. It’s a requirement, really.”

“Ruth!” Maura pretended to be shocked. “You’re so sassy.”

“Don’t tell them,” Ruth said in a mock-whisper. “I’m silently sassy. It’s all in my head, while they rant on and on about their bullshit.”

“Ruth!” Maura let out a squeak of laughter, then waved off the attention of the neighboring table. “You should really drink wine more often.”

Giggling, Ruth took several more sips. “Okay. But seriously, the only men who want to work at our farm are very strange. But I’d never seen that other man before. He was different, more of a business type of man. I’ve seen that sort in the past, when Luke was still here.”

Maura didn’t know the full story, but she knew that Luke, the Chilkoot patriarch, was now in prison. “Who treated his wound? Did you?”

“I helped at first. But then they shooed me away because he needed to take his pants off. The bite looked really bad. He lost a lot of blood. I hope it didn’t get infected.”

“Did you catch his name?”

“He didn’t say his name.” Ruth took refuge in her glass of wine.

“But you might have overheard it.”

“Eavesdropping is a sin. It was men’s business.” Then she dissolved into giggles, and whispered, “His name was Al Grover. I listened in. I’m silently sassy and sinful, I guess.”

“I’ll drink to that.” Maura lifted her glass in a “cheers.” “Do you know where he went? Afterwards, I mean?”

“No. As soon as he could get onto his snowmobile, he left. He went down the road, but that’s all I know. But I think he left some money behind, with the men.”

“Who are these men you keep talking about?”

“My cousins, my uncles, my brothers. Some of them were in trouble along with Luke, but some were released and came back. I make them stay in a different house from the kids because the state might take the kids away if they’re exposed to anything criminal. I don’t trust them anymore. Do you know how hard it is to say that?” She held up a hand and whispered behind it. “I feel ashamed, but it’s true.”

“Why should you feel ashamed? They should. I think ‘silently sassy and sinful Ruth’ has the right idea.”

Ruth cheered up and giggled again. “I like you. I wish we were friends.”

“We can be friends.” Maura eyed her carefully, measuring how much she could say. “I know what it’s like to find out you can’t trust the people you thought were trustworthy.”

“You do?”

“I’ll tell you sometime,” she promised. “For now, can I ask you one more question about that man, Al Grover?”

“Okay.” An uneasy frown appeared between her eyebrows. “But I don’t know him.”

“Yes, I know.” Maura decided her best approach was to be fully transparent. “Lachlan and I were trying to figure out why that wolf attacked him. When we went out to your place to follow his tracks, we found a grenade in the snow. We think that he dropped it. But we don’t know why he had a grenade with him. Then when we got back to the truck, we found a note warning us to stay away. Elias said the note was written by Jared. Do you know why Jared would want to keep us away? Does any of this make sense to you?”

Ruth’s frown grew deeper. She looked away, bit her lip, looked back at her wine, pushed it away from her. “You should probably listen to that warning.”

“Of course we’re going to. We wouldn’t go to your place unless we were invited anyway.”

Clearly struggling with something, Ruth stared into her wine glass. “They’re up to something, but I don’t know what it is. I think it might have to do with a woman.”

“A woman?” That surprised Maura. “What woman?”

“I don’t know, honestly. I’ve heard them say ‘she,’ that’s all. And they expect to make a profit. A windfall, that’s what they say. We could use it, to be honest, as long as they’re not doing anything illegal.”

“But you don’t think they are?”

“They promised me they wouldn’t.”

Which didn’t quite answer the question.

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