Page 4 of Rocky Ride

“You’re here early, Sheriff Frost.”

“I told you I’d be early. Are the ashes ready?”

“Yes. Those are Olivia Best’s ashes right there in the marked container. Were you thinking of purchasing an urn, Sheriff?”

“Nope. This will be fine. Thanks.”

Back in the truck, Travis lit up a smoke, drove up Main Street and passed the station without giving it a glance.

“Stay focused and don’t fuckin lose it.” He said out loud to ground himself.

He passed the Inn and turned his head the opposite way. Same thing when he whizzed by the roadhouse. Nothing mattered except getting to the mountains and making things right with Olivia.

Northbound on I-15, Travis took the ramp for route two and headed west. He hadn’t been outside his own county going straight west before, so he might see new country and was looking forward to the experience.

I can’t lose focus.

Sheriff’s Office. Coyote Creek.

Molly was sad about Travis’s trip to the mountains with the ashes, and even more depressed because he took Max and Sargewith him. She had no dogs under her desk while she worked, and she said it felt wrong.

“Did he mention how long he’d be gone?”

“I asked him that,” said Virge. “Said it depended on the weather conditions, how much snow and an armload of shit like that.”

“Perhaps he’s unsure himself,” said Molly. “That might be it. He couldn’t give you a ballpark estimate.”

Billy nodded.

The landline rang on Molly’s desk, and she answered, then picked up her pen and started writing on her yellow pad. That meant somebody wanted a sheriff. Molly hung up the phone and read from her pad, “Go to this address in Ethridge. Krystal Daniels. That’s her new married name. She owns the strip club in Ethridge.”

“What’s her problem?” asked Billy. He knew Krystal slightly from an old case.

“She says a bunch of Ethridge housewives are ganging up on her and they set fire to the dumpster behind her building and tried to burn the Krystal Palace down.”

“Huh,” said Ted with a smirk on his face. “Sounds interesting. I’ll go do the interview, Billy.”

“Go for it, Ted. See if you can sort Krystal out.”

“I want to go,” said Virge. “What else are me and Harlan gonna do? I wanna forget about Dad being gone and eyeball me some strippers.”

“The peelers ain’t at her house,” said Ted.

Molly giggled. “You’re going to Krystal’s house, Virgil, not to her so-calledpalace.”

He shrugged. “We might have to go to the palace later and check something out.”

“Okay,” said Billy. “Ted, take the boys with you, but don’t lose them at the strip club.”

“I’ll keep them on tight leashes, boss.”

Billy laughed and headed for his office. The boys were already down in the dumps and if Travis didn’t come back for a while, they were gonna get worse every fuckin day. He had to watch them close so they didn’t run to the Rockies looking for their father. Because for sure they would. Billy would put money on it.

Houma. Louisiana.

Mason Swift locked up his house on the river and tossed his duffel in the back of his truck. He held the door open on the passenger side for his bloodhound, Clyde to jump in.

He hooked up his Jon boat, made sure he had three Jerrycans for extra gas and the picture of the girl he was getting paid to find. Waiting for a couple of articles of her clothing to arrive by courier had held him up a couple of days.

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