Virgin River (Virgin River #1)(22)

“You got it,” Jack said, setting him up.

The man threw back the shot right away, then lifted the beer, all without making any eye contact with Jack. Fine, we won’t talk, Jack thought. I have things to do anyway. So Jack went back to counting bottles.

About ten minutes had passed when he heard, “Hey, buddy. Once more, huh?”

“You bet,” Jack said, serving him another round. Again silence prevailed. The man took a little longer on his beer, time enough for Jack to get a good bit of his inventory done. While he was crouched behind the bar, a shadow fell over him and he looked up to see the man standing right on the other side of the bar, ready to settle up.

Jack stood just as the man was reaching into his pocket. He noticed a bit of tattoo sneaking out from the sleeve of his shirt—the recognizable feet of a bulldog—the Devil Dog. Jack was close to remarking on it—the man wore an unmistakable United States Marine Corps tattoo. But then the man pulled a thick wad of bills out, peeled off a hundred and said, “Can you change this?”

Jack didn’t even have to touch the bill; the skunklike odor of green cannabis wafted toward him. The man had just done some cutting—pruning or harvesting and, from the stinky cash, had made a sale. Jack could change the bill, but he didn’t want to advertise how much cash he kept on hand and he didn’t want that money on the premises. There were plenty of growers out there—some with prescriptions for legal use, conscious of the medical benefits. There were those who thought of marijuana as just any old plant, like corn. Agriculture. A way to make money. And some who dealt drugs because the drugs would offer a big profit. This part of the country was often referred to as the Emerald Triangle for the three counties most known for the cannabis trade. Lots of nice, new, half-ton trucks being driven by people on a busboy’s salary.

Some of the towns around these parts catered to them, selling supplies illegal growers needed—irrigation tubing, grow lights, camouflage tarps, plastic sheeting, shears in various sizes for harvesting and pruning. Scales, generators, ATVs for getting off-road and back into secretive hideaways buried in the forest. There were merchants around who displayed signs in their windows that said, CAMP Not Served Here. CAMP being the Campaign Against Marijuana Planting that was a joint operation between the County Sheriff’s Department and the state of California. Clear River was a town that didn’t like CAMP and didn’t mind taking the growers’ money, of which there was a lot. Charmaine didn’t approve of the illegal growing, but Butch wouldn’t turn down a stinky bill.

Virgin River was not that kind of town.

Growers usually maintained low profiles and didn’t cause problems, not wanting to be raided. But sometimes there were territorial conflicts between them or booby-trapped grows, either one of which could hurt an innocent citizen. There were drug-related crimes ranging from burglary or robbery to murder. Not so long ago they found the body of a grower’s partner buried in the woods near Garberville; he’d been missing for over two years and the grower himself had always been a suspect.

You couldn’t find anything in Virgin River that would encourage an illegal crop, one means of keeping them away. If there were any growers in town, they were real, real secret. Virgin River tended to push this sort away. But this wasn’t the first one to pass by.

“Tell you what,” Jack said to the man, making long and serious eye contact. “On the house this time.”

“Thanks,” he said, folding his bill back onto the wad and stuffing it in his pocket. He turned to go.

“And buddy?” Jack called as the man reached the door to leave. He turned and Jack said, “Sheriff’s deputy and California Highway Patrol eat and drink on the house in my place.”

The man’s shoulders rose once with a silent huff of laughter. He was on notice. He touched the brim of his hat and left.

Jack walked around the bar and looked out the window to see the man get into a black late model Range Rover, supercharged, big wheels jacked up real high, windows tinted, lights on the roof. That model would go for nearly a hundred grand. This guy was no hobbyist. He memorized the license plate.

Preacher was rolling out pie dough when Jack went into the kitchen. “I just served a guy who tried to pay for his drinks with a wad of stinky Bens as big as my fist,” Jack told him.

“Crap.”

“He’s driving a new Range Rover, loaded, jacked up and lit up. Big guy.”

“You think he’s growing around town here?”

“Have no idea,” Jack said. “We better pay attention. Next time the deputy’s in town, I’ll mention it. But it’s not against the law to have stinky money or drive a big truck.”

“If he’s rich, it’s probably not a small operation,” Preacher said.

“He’s got a bulldog tattoo on his upper right arm.”

Preacher frowned. “You kind of hate to see a brother go that way.”

“Yeah, tell me about it. Maybe he’s not in business around here. He could have been just scoping out the town to see if this is a good place to set up. I think I sent the message that it’s not. I told him law enforcement eats and drinks on the house.”

Preacher smiled. “We should start doing that, then,” he said.

“How about a discount, to start? We don’t want to get crazy.”