She had unwittingly struck a sore spot. Reede Lambert was defensive about his motherless childhood. Now, however, wasn’t the time to probe for more information. Not with nearly every eye in the place watching them.
He devoured two doughnuts and washed them down with black coffee, wasting neither food, nor time, nor motion. He ate like he thought it might be a long time before his next meal.
“Busy place,” she commented, unself-consciously licking glaze off her fingers.
“Yeah. The old-timers like me leave the new shopping mall and fast food places out by the interstate to the newcomers and teenagers. If you can’t find who you’re looking for anyplace else, he’s usually at the B & B. Angus’ll probably be along directly. ME’s corporate headquarters is just one block off the square, but he conducts a lot of business right here in this room.”
“Tell me about the Mintons.”
He reached for the last doughnut, since it was obvious that Alex wasn’t going to eat it. “They’re rich, but not showy. Well liked around town.”
“Or feared.”
“By some, maybe,” he conceded with a shrug.
“The ranch is only one of their businesses?”
“Yeah, but it’s the granddaddy. Angus built it out of nothing but acres of dust and sheer determination.”
“What exactly do they do out there?”
“Basically, they’re a racehorse training outfit. Thoroughbreds mostly. Some Quarter Horses. They board up to a hundred and fifty horses at a time, and get them ready for the track trainers.”
“You seem to know a lot about it.”
“I own a couple of racehorses myself. I board them out there permanently.” He pointed down to her half-empty coffee cup. “If you’re finished, I’d like to show you something.”
“What?” she asked, surprised by the sudden shift in topic.
“It’s not far.”
They left the B & B, but not before Reede said good-bye to everyone he’d said hello to when they came in. He didn’t pay for the breakfast, but was saluted by Pete the cook and given an affectionate pat by the waitress.
Reede’s official car, a Blazer truck, was parked at the curb in front of the courthouse. The space was reserved for him, marked with a small sign. He unlocked the door, helped Alex up into the cab of the four-wheel-drive vehicle, then joined her. He drove only a few blocks before pulling up in front of a small house. “That’s it,” he said.
“What?”
“Where your mother lived.” Alex whipped her head around to stare at the frame dwelling. “The neighborhood isn’t what it was when she lived here. It’s gone to pot. There used to be a tree there, where the sidewalk dips slightly.”
“Yes. I’ve seen pictures.”
“It died a few years ago and had to be cut down. Anyway,” he said, slipping the truck back into gear, “I thought you’d want to see it.”
“Thank you.” As he pulled the Blazer away from the curb, Alex kept her eyes on the house. The white paint had grayed. Hot summer suns had faded the maroon awnings over the front windows. It wasn’t attractive, but she swiveled her head and kept it in sight as long as she could.
That’s where she had lived with her mother for two short months. In those rooms, Celina had fed her, bathed her, rocked her, and sang her lullabies. There, she had listened for Alex’s crying in the night. Those walls had heard her mother’s whispered vows of love to her baby girl.
Alex didn’t remember, of course. But she knew that’s how it had been.
Tamping down the stirring emotions, she picked up the conversation they had been having when they had left the B & B. “Why is this proposed racetrack so important to the Mintons?”
He glanced at her as though she’d lost her senses. “Money. Why else?”
“It sounds like they’ve got plenty.”
“Nobody ever has enough money,” he remarked with a grim smile. “And only somebody who’s been as poor as me can say that. Look around.” He gestured at the empty stores along the main thoroughfare they were now traveling. “See all the empty businesses and foreclosure notices? When the oil market went bust, so did the economy of this town. Just about everybody worked in an oil-related occupation.”
“I understand all that.”