He broke off, then added, “Listen, I have a call coming in on another line. I’ll have my secretary see to Mr. Flores’s replacement card.”
“Thanks.” Molly clicked off and went back to Ramon, picking up the clipboard from the empty seat beside him. Looking at him for permission, he nodded, and she quickly scanned the paperwork. Uncapping the pen, she filled in the lines Ramon had left blank, showing him before returning it to the clerk.
Back in her seat, she called the farm to ask Henry Garcia, her dad’s long-standing ranch manager, to drive another of her hands out in the Jeep to collect the delivery truck. “Henry, see if there’s anything salvageable of the load. Maybe there’s stuff we can give to the food bank.”
She hesitated before adding, “Watch yourselves.”
She signed off and idly picked up a tattered magazine. She tried to think what next steps she could take to keep what had happened to Ramon from happening again. She remained at a loss as to why anyone would do such a thing.
While he was being examined, Molly stepped outside to call the weekly newspaper to place an ad for an experienced truck driver. She added a line about having to be able to heft fifty-pound crates. A crate rarely weighed that much, but maybe it would net her a brawny guy capable of holding his own against miscreants.
Going back inside, she sat again until Ramon came out of the examining room.
“The doctor didn’t find any bad injuries. He cleaned my cuts and gave me an antibiotic cream. He says I should do light duty for a week because my ribs are bruised.”
“I’m glad it’s not worse.” Molly paid with her farm credit card and they left.
They didn’t talk much on the drive.
As she dropped Ramon off at his house, she said, “Plan on potting in the greenhouses until you heal. Once you’re better you can join the irrigation crew where you’ll make a little more money.”
“I’ll work hard at whatever you want me to do.”
“I know that, Ramon.”
* * *
TWO DAYS LATER the newspaper with her ad came out and Molly alerted Henry to take phone numbers from interested applicants.
But for three days no one called. Busy harvesting lettuce, Swiss chard, radishes and bush beans, and with spring weather warming and ripening the tomatoes, Molly, who disliked driving the flatbed, packed her SUV and made extra trips to the markets. She took Nitro and remained vigilant. Luckily there were no incidents.
By Wednesday of the following week she’d only talked to two candidates. Both unsuitable. She began to worry that she’d blown it with the weight requirement...and had been too quick to dismiss those applicants. Although one had had no references and the other had been fired from his previous job for drinking, clearly thinking that wouldn’t come up in a reference check.
Thursday morning, as she prepared to go to a market in Carrizo Springs, Molly noticed a well-dressed man talking to a field hand in a newly plowed area earmarked for local students: a planting program she’d established for third-graders from two low-income schools.
“Henry, who’s the guy talking to Rick?”
The manager stepped out of the barn. “I don’t know. I saw him a couple of weeks ago walking the spinach rows. I thought from his clothes he was an inspector.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me that?”
She stripped off her gloves and snapped her fingers to rouse Nitro from his snooze.
“I know all the food safety inspectors,” she said, clipping on the dog’s leash. The man in question wore pants, a short-sleeved shirt and a tie. She saw him squat and sift dirt through one hand. “Considering what happened to Ramon, I don’t like strangers wandering my land.”
It only took her a couple of minutes to cross the field and come up on the man from behind.
Nitro began to growl.
The stranger sprang up, dusted off his hands and backed away.
Molly delivered a hand command to Nitro, but the big dog strained at his leash.
“May I ask what you are doing? I’m Molly McNair. I own this land.”
“You grow some fine-looking vegetables. Good soil, I assume?”
“Very. Are you a state inspector?”
“Nope.” The man stepped farther away from Nitro.
“I don’t sell direct to the public.” She named a few farmers’ markets. “You can find us there. I open for U-pick at the end of harvest.”
The man said nothing.
“I see a Humvee parked up on the main highway. Most visitors drive through our gate and down the lane. I’ll ask again... Who are you?”
Molly had learned from her years in the Peace Corps to judge friend and foe quickly. She absorbed the stranger’s toothy smile, noting it didn’t reach his cold blue eyes.
He dug a business card out of his shirt pocket and extended it—jerking back his hand when Nitro bared his teeth.
“Settle, Nitro.”
Molly picked up the fallen card and was surprised that it had nothing on it about farm implements, fertilizers or any possible outlet for her wares.
“Branchville Oil? Not what I expected. That’s a group my dad wanted nothing to do with.”
“I’m a new subcontractor. I understand they tried to buy mineral rights from Mr. McNair. Branchville is on the hunt for new oil fields in South Texas. If you still hold those rights—” he motioned one hand in a circle “—I’m prepared to offer you a fair sum to let the company sink a dozen or so small test holes. It’s lucrative income for doing nothing on your part. If I find oil, we’ll bargain for significantly more money.”
Molly tried to pass back his card, but his hands were now in his pockets.
“I’ve no interest in letting anyone search for fossil fuel on my land. The answer is no.”
The man’s jaw tensed.
“Your name is...?” Molly persisted. “There’s none on this business card.”
“Think the offer over. When you’re ready to deal, call the number at the bottom. A few pumping oil wells will earn you a lot more than slaving over crops that depend on many more variables.”
“Such as?”
“Drought. Floods. Tornadoes.”
She stared at the man for a moment before he turned and walked away.
Molly watched him weave through her field of pole beans and up the bank to the black Humvee, where he got in and quickly drove off.
Only then did Nitro settle.
Henry materialized at Molly’s elbow. “What did he want? Did he say why he didn’t come in through the main gate?”
Giving a half laugh, she showed Henry the card. “He’s a man with no name who wants to dig test wells in the middle of my crops.”
The old man took the card in a gnarled brown hand. His eyes remained on the road. “Your papa thought you should fence along the highway. Maybe it’s time.”
“Maybe.” Molly strode out of the empty field to her SUV. “Right now I have produce to deliver.”
* * *
ADAM HOLLISTER FINISHED setting up a row of clean pilsner glasses and gave the glazed oak counter a last wipe before he opened the bar. It was midweek. He didn’t expect much traffic other than the few regulars who stopped by after work.
He straightened stools on his way to put out the Open sign. Heading back, he plugged some