Chapter 40

CHAPTER 40

SLATE

T he sun was beating down on me as I finished talking to the crew. I stepped up to Tony and shook his hand. "Thanks, man. Let me know if you find anything weird during the repairs. We need to get to the bottom of this."

"Sure thing, Slate. I agree with you. Incidents like this don't happen spontaneously, and usually, they're not a one and done." He breathed out as he nodded. Then he turned to put his guys back to work. "Let's get going, gentlemen. We need to get this sealed up nice and tight before sunset."

The workers nodded and trudged back to their stations, everyone filthy and sweaty, but with a lot left to do before the end of the day. I watched as they got back to it. Then I sighed and started toward the house.

My legs protested every step, my very bones exhausted even though it was only the afternoon. I'd spent the whole day working with the crew, discovering the machines were more extensively damaged than I'd originally anticipated.

The whole thing left a sour taste in my mouth and a churning pit of rage in my stomach. At first, I'd thought I might've jumped to conclusions about the sabotage, but as soon as I'd started poking around, I'd known I'd been right.

Then the crew had come speeding in. Once they'd created a more reliable seal, we'd gotten to work assessing the cause of the damage. It boggled my mind that the machines had been so thoroughly tampered with without anyone on the farm hearing or seeing anything.

Jess and I had been sleeping in an open hayloft, for God's sake. We should've heard something. Shit, we'd been up half the night talking. We might've even been awake when all this had been happening, and yet, we hadn't been aware of a single thing going wrong. Hadn't even caught a whiff of trouble in the air. It made no sense to me whatsoever and yet those were the facts.

Still trying to wrap my head around it, I walked into the house to find Austin fuming in the kitchen. He paced in front of the windows, dragging his hand repeatedly through his hair while Jeanie, Doug, and Jess watched on.

Jeanie stood up from her spot at the old table when I walked in, her eyes dark with worry. "Slate, honey. Let me get you some lemonade. How is everything out there?"

At the sound of my name, Austin stopped pacing and snapped his head around to face me. "What have they found?"

"The damage was worse than we thought. Both to the equipment and to the ground itself. It's going to take a lot longer for all the oil that has spilled now to settle back down and clean itself up."

Jess let out a soft moan and scrubbed a hand over her face. She plopped her chin in her palm. Jeanie sighed and Doug didn't react at all, just staring at me and nodding swiftly to acknowledge what I'd said.

Austin, on the other hand, seemed to be on the war path. His lips twisted in a sneer and he scoffed. "The timing of this is very fucking suspicious. I just got off the phone to some locals to find out if anyone saw or heard something out of the ordinary, but the only thing anyone noticed is Oden Sawyer's fancy little toy of a car."

A toy of a car that cost over a million dollars, but sure. Let's go with that.

I exhaled slowly, fighting to keep my own energy from getting as aggressive as his. Losing our tempers on each other really wouldn't help.

"This isn't Oden's style," I said. "I'm not saying he wasn't responsible, but if this was him, then he must be desperate. As for talking to the locals, that wasn't a good idea, Austin."

"Why not?" He arched an eyebrow at me, indignant fury flashing across his features. "They're our friends and our neighbors. They want to help."

"I'm sure some of them do, but ultimately, we don't know who did this yet and now you're spreading the news prematurely."

He scoffed, facing off with me in earnest. "I grew up with the people in this town, Spieres. If this was sabotage, the person who did it isn't from Firefly Grove. They're our allies. They can help us find the truth."

When I didn't relent immediately, he got even more defensive as he resumed his pacing. "It's funny that you'd defend Oden Sawyer and point the finger at the locals instead. What does that mean, Slate? Does that mean?—"

"It doesn't mean anything other than we don't know who did this. I'm not defending Oden. All I'm saying is that he doesn't usually operate this way. He just made you an offer yesterday and sure, maybe he sent someone out to wreak some havoc so you'd make up your minds a little faster, but we just don't know yet."

Before he could spew more bullshit at me, I gave his phone a pointed look. "Stay off that thing. I respect your optimism about the locals, but it could be misplaced. I think it might be misplaced. Until we know more, it's in your best interest to keep this on the down low."

As I said it, I moved my gaze away from Austin's to look at Doug, Jess, and even Jeanie in turn. Everybody in this family needed to know that they had to keep their mouths shut about the sabotage for now.

Balancing out her son, Jeanie smiled at me and nodded. It wasn't a radiant, beaming smile like the ones I usually got from her, but it was better than nothing.

"Of course, honey. If you think that's for the best. But do you mind telling us why? Austin's not wrong about the people he's been speaking to. They're our friends and neighbors. We've known them all our lives. None of them would've done anything to hurt us."

"I want to believe you," I said. "In fact, from what I've seen from the people I've met around here, I do believe you, but all it takes is one bad apple."

"You think someone is jealous of us?" Jess asked quietly, surprising me by how level-headed she was being about all this. She glanced at her brother. "It's not impossible, Austin. I don't want to think it could be true either, but there are a lot of people in this county who've had a tough go of it the last few years. Any number of them might not want the sun to shine on someone else."

Austin opened his mouth to respond, but we didn't need this spiraling into an argument about whether or not absolutely everyone in Firefly Grove was honorable and loyal. I jumped in before he could utter another word about it.

"This isn't just about that." I gratefully accepted the lemonade Jeanie handed me and joined her, Doug, and Jess at the table.

Austin was still scowling at me from where he was standing in front of the windows. "What else is it about, then? You're accusing?—"

"I'm not accusing anyone," I said emphatically, looking him right in the eyes. "Whoever did this, we'll find them, but spreading the word just shines a spotlight on what's been happening at Merrick Meadows."

He frowned. "So what?"

"If the media were to catch wind of this, they'd run with it. They'd report the story far and wide of the farming family who struck it rich one day." When he narrowed his eyes at me, I clarified. "That's not what I think of you. It's how they're going to spin it. Rags to riches. That sort of thing. They'd have a field day with it. and soon, the whole state would know about you striking oil. There's just no way of knowing what kind of ripple effects that might cause, let alone what they'd print about your family while they're at it."

"So what?" he asked again. "We can take whatever they write about us, and who cares if everyone knows?"

"You should," I said. "Because once they find out, your hands will be tied. If the world finds out what you're doing here, you'll lose your privacy."

I let that sink in for a minute, draining some more of my lemonade. I made sure to make eye contact with everyone in the family once more. "The seriousness of that cannot be overstated. Every decision you make will become a public one and the opinions of the world are much louder and heavier than you might realize."

Jess paled, but at least she seemed to be getting it. "Not everyone will support us, will they?"

I shook my head. "You'll have environmentalists crawling up your asses in no time. They'll picket outside your gate and take up residence in town, spewing their hatred for what's happening here all over everyone you've ever known."

Austin scoffed. "They can't be that bad."

"In general, they're not," I agreed. "However, like with everything else, there are a few bad apples. People who are more extreme than others and they'll know that fighting you will be easier than fighting big oil."

"Dang," Jess said.

"At the moment, you're only dealing with Oden as a representative of a big oil client. If word of this spreads further, you'll have more big companies throwing their hats in the ring to buy the farm. Not all of them will go about it the way whoever Oden's client is did. If they're desperate enough to win, there's no knowing how far they'd go to force you off the property if you won't budge."

Jeanie gasped. Her shoulders sagged as she rubbed her temples, but I wasn't done yet. "You'll have developers wanting a cut and people asking for handouts." I turned to Jess, speaking directly to her now. "This is yours and you must treat it as such."

A glint of determination sparked in her eyes. "You're absolutely right."

Doug finally stirred, putting the matter to bed when he turned to his son. "Slate is definitely right about this, boy. From here on out, nobody talks about the oil on this farm to anybody who isn't in this room or who needs to know for business purposes." He inclined his head at me. "That means Slate can keep updating Mira and whoever else he needs to speak to, but the rest of us are sealing our lips. No arguments."

He walked to the windows and pulled aside the curtain, peering out at the machinery and crews desperately trying to salvage it. "This has made one thing perfectly clear to me."

"What?" Jess, Austin, and Jeanie asked in unison, everybody leaning forward.

Frankly, I was just as curious about what he'd suddenly gotten clarity about. Doug wasn't a man who reacted to everything that happened, as it happened. He was even keeled and quiet, a simple man with a big heart who wanted the best for everyone he loved.

To me, he also seemed surprisingly self-actualized. He didn't appear to hang onto any negativity and he wasn't easily swayed.

For him to say that something had been made clear to him meant that he'd made up his mind about whatever it was, and he'd dig in heels and stick to his guns. He glanced at the dig site again. "We're not selling to Oden Sawyer. If someone is willing to take the risk of coming onto our property and tampering with our equipment, they must know something we don't. They must believe we've hit the jackpot, and I'm not getting out of the way or leaving the fight early if that's true. The Merricks have been on this property for too long to simply hand over its hidden riches to the highest bidder with the fastest lawyers."