Virgin River (Virgin River #1)(112)

“I look out for Ricky. We’ll all be looking out for him, but believe me—he’s up to this. I taught him to shoot myself. He wouldn’t be left out, because it’s about you.”

“Is this absolutely necessary?”

“Yes,” he said, and looked down at her with the expression she had learned meant he was all about business.

Jim Post was beside Jack, grinning. “Morning,” he said.

“Does June know you’re doing this?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And what did she say?”

“Something like, ‘You better be careful.’ The hard part was convincing old Doc Hudson he couldn’t come.”

“Isn’t this better left to the police? The sheriff?”

Jim put a foot up on the porch step. He shrugged. “We’ve already told Henry about Paulis’s camp and gave him the description of the vehicle being driven by the man who probably had it set up. Hopefully, the Paulis camp is deserted and their plants left behind. We saw ’em, Mel—and there’s no question—those old squatters didn’t bring a semi in, bury it, camouflage it and set up a grow. But someone did—and there could be more of those. There’s real trouble way back in there—on federal land. We’re not going that far back. We’ll stay out of their business. We’ll leave that up to the professionals.”

“It just seems so vigilante-like,” she said.

“Naw, we’re not going to do anything illegal, Mel. We’re just going to send a little message. You don’t want to give our women, our towns, any reason to feel they have to fight back. Understand?” She didn’t answer. “If there’s anything like that near enough to threaten Virgin River, we’ll give them a chance to run for their lives before we disclose their location to authorities. It’ll be fine. We’ll be home by dark.”

She said to Jack, “I’m going to be scared to death all day.”

“Do I have to stay here with you, so you won’t be scared?” he asked her. “Or can you believe in me one more time?”

She bit her lip, but nodded. He slipped an arm around her waist and lifted her up to his mouth, kissing her deeply. “You taste so good in the morning,” he said, smiling down at her. “Is that normal?” he teased.

“You’d better be careful,” she said. “Remember that I love you.”

“I don’t need any more than that,” he said, putting her back on her feet. Preacher came to the porch. He nodded at her, bushy brows drawn together in a frown that made her almost shudder. “Just send him in,” Mel said. “That’ll scare them all away.” And to her surprise, Preacher smiled so big, for a moment she didn’t recognize him.

When they had finally left in a grand parade, Mel called June. “Do you know what your husband is doing?” she asked.

“Yes,” June said, sounding annoyed. “Not babysitting.”

“Are you worried?”

“Only that one of them will shoot off a toe. Why? Are you?”

“Well…Yes! You should have seen them—in their vests and with those big guns. I mean, big guns!”

“Well, there are bear out there, you know. You don’t want a peashooter,” June said.

“You don’t have to worry about Jack, honey. I think it’s been established he’s a good shot, if he needs to be.”

“What about Jim?”

“Jim?” She laughed. “Mel, Jim used to do this for a living. He won’t admit he misses it just a little bit. But I swear I heard him giggle.”

All day long she had visions of gun battles in the forest. The unfortunate lack of work couldn’t keep her from pacing. With the bar closed and so many of the men out on the scavenger hunt, the town was impossibly quiet.

Mel spent most of the day on Doc’s porch, sitting on the steps. It was about noon when the black Range Rover pulled slowly into town. He drove up alongside the clinic and lowered his tinted window. “I heard what happened to you,” he said.

“You did? I didn’t know we had any mutual friends.”

“I wanted to tell you a couple of things, because you did me a favor. Number one—I know about Thompson and he’s a loose cannon. I know a lot of what goes on back there and there aren’t any others like him, that I know of. People like Vickie—that’s the woman who had the baby—she’s been in some trouble, but she’s not dangerous to anybody. She just flies under the radar, has had some tough breaks, doesn’t know a lot of ways to make money. By the way—she’s gone. Took that baby and went to a sister’s in Arizona. I got her on a bus.”

“You said Nevada before,” Mel said.

“Did I now?” he asked, a small smile. “Well, I could be mistaken.”

“I just hope you know where to send the check, since it’s yours.”

“I said, they’ll have what they need. Didn’t I say that?”

She was silent a moment, thinking. The check he was going to send would come from the sale of marijuana. There were people who thought it was no worse than a few beers, and she was about to pledge her life and love to a man who owned a bar, thought nothing of serving up a few beers. Then there were others who recognized its medical benefits. And a third faction saw it as a dangerous drug—one that, in the wrong hands, perhaps young hands, could lead to more dangerous addictions. Mel only knew two things: it was still illegal without a prescription and, because it was illegal, crime was often associated with it.