Loaded. Joanna Wayne

convenient, not that Mom would ever play matchmaker.” That brought a few laughs.

      Matt groaned. His mother had managed to manipulate him into situations with half the single women in Colts Run Cross over the last few months. He hadn’t taken the bait then and he wouldn’t be biting this time, either, certainly not with a city girl out here for a change of scenery.

      “This isn’t about Matt,” Lenora said. “It’s about Jeremiah.”

      His grandfather picked that moment to join them on the porch. He propped his cane against the old wicker couch and dropped to the cushioned seat. “What about me?”

      “I’ve hired a physical therapist,” Lenora said. “She’s from Georgia, but she’s going to live with us and help you regain your balance and strength.”

      He sputtered and muttered a few curses under his breath. “If I wanted to be manhandled by a woman, I’d have remarried.”

      Trish walked over and sat down by Jeremiah. She had a way with the old codger, but then she pretty much had a way with everyone.

      “Having a live-in therapist seems the perfect solution to me,” Trish said. “You never want to go to your appointments. This way you won’t have to.”

      “I don’t go to therapy because the sessions don’t do a dadgummed bit of good. If they did, I wouldn’t be hobbling around here like some useless old man, now would I?”

      “You limp,” Trish admitted. “But you could never be useless.”

      I’ve hired Shelly Lane,” Lenora said. “If you want to get rid of that cane, you’ll cooperate with her. If you’re too hardheaded to work with her, then it will be your loss. She’s moving in tomorrow.” Lenora dusted her hands as if that were the end of the matter, but that didn’t mean it was.

      “Tomorrow?” Jaime questioned. “I thought this new physical therapist was in the hospital.”

      Lenora kicked off her black sandals and pulled a foot into the chair with her, settling it under her full black skirt. “If not tomorrow, then the next day. She’s coming here to recuperate.”

      “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Langston questioned.

      “Why wouldn’t it be? She doesn’t have anywhere else to go,” Lenora said. “Besides, it will give her a chance to get to know Jeremiah before she starts working with him.”

      “Yeah, like that’s an advantage,” Jaime mocked.

      Matt’s muscles tightened. “I know you mean well, Mom, but you can’t just move her onto the ranch until we have more facts about today’s attack.”

      “What’s to know?” Lenora asked. “She was just crossing the street and someone started firing at her. You were the one who told me what happened, Matt. That’s why I went to the hospital to check on her.”

      “That’s the way it looked,” Matt said, “and the way Shelly told it, but at this point there’s no way to know she’s leveling with us. The shooter could be someone she knows.”

      Jeremiah swung his cane in the air, banging it into the leg of a table and sending a half-empty glass of iced tea into a wobbling dance that fortunately ended without the glass hitting the floor. “Don’t know what this world’s coming to, but if some sick bastard’s trying to kill her, you ought to already have her out here. Can’t expect a woman to take care of herself.”

      “Right,” Jaime said, mocking him. “What would we ever do without a man to take care of us?”

      “Let’s get back to Shelly Lane,” Langston said. “She’s probably as innocent in all this as she claims, but to be on the safe side, I’d like to have Clay Markham investigate her before we move her onto Jack’s Bluff. He’s as competent a private detective as you’ll find anywhere in Texas, and Collingsworth Oil has him on retainer.”

      “And I say we get Aidan Jefferies to run a police background check on her as well,” Matt said. “If they both clear her, then Mom can move her in with no worries.” Aidan was one of Langston’s closest friends and a Houston homicide detective.

      “How long are we talking about for these investigations?” Lenora asked.

      “A few days at most,” Langston assured her. “Actually, they’ll probably know by tomorrow night if she’s had any other attempts on her life or reported any type of threats. They’ll definitely know if she has a police record of any kind.”

      “I guess I can live with that,” Lenora said, “though I hate to tell her that I’m going back on my offer to move her out here tomorrow. And I don’t like the idea of her going back to that motel all alone.”

      “Have the doctor keep her in the hospital,” Matt said. “I don’t know why he’d object to that, as long as we pick up the tab.”

      “I suppose that’s an option,” Lenora said. “And tomorrow’s probably not the best day to have her out here, anyway, what with children from the Turnaround Program coming out for the day.”

      Matt groaned. “That’s tomorrow?”

      “Yes, and you promised to help with the horse riding,” Lenora said, smoothing her short graying hair. “I’ll give Shelly’s doctor a call, but I guess I should go back into town tonight and break the news to Shelly in person.”

      “I’ll do it,” Matt said, suddenly uneasy with his mother becoming too involved with Shelly before they had an official report.

      “Okay, but don’t tell her the delay is because we’re having her investigated. Just say I’m getting her room ready so that everything will be perfect when she arrives.”

      Matt shrugged. “Sorry, Mom, I’m not into sugarcoating.”

      “Just be nice,” Lenora said. “Miss Lane’s welcome to Texas has already been traumatic enough.”

      “I’m always nice.”

      “Compared to what?” Jaime asked. “A striking rattlesnake?”

      “Just because I’m not a pushover for a smile and a pretty face doesn’t mean I’m unsociable.”

      “Pretty, huh?” Jaime smiled tauntingly. “This story just keeps getting better. But I’ll have to hear the rest tomorrow. I’ve got a date with Tommy Stevens tonight, and he should be here to pick me up any minute.”

      “When did you start dating him?” Trish asked. “I thought you were back with Garth.”

      “Not anymore. All he thinks about is running off to some new rodeo competition. Like at twenty-five, don’t you think he’d have better things to do than try to stay on a stupid bull?”

      Matt would have thought the guy had better things to do than date Jaime. She was as fickle as a mare at breeding time. But all she had to do was crook her finger and Garth—and half the male population of south Texas—came running. He hoped someone would shoot him if he ever got that crazy about any woman.

      His cell phone rang. He checked the caller ID: sheriff’s office. He walked to the kitchen to take the call. Ten to one this had to do with Shelly Lane, and the odds were even better that it was not good news.

      Chapter Three

      “What’s up, Ed?” Matt asked as soon as the sheriff identified himself.

      “I just talked to Emile Henley up at the Shell Station on the highway west of town. He said a stranger in a black Ford Fusion stopped for gas at his place about an hour before today’s shooting.”

      “That’s interesting. Did he think the man might have been drunk or high on something?”

      “Nope, just buck-snorting arrogant according to Emile. He said he tried to make small talk when the guy came inside for cigarettes, but the man just made some comment about Colts Run Cross being