The place was busy. Young moms with toddlers in strollers competed for space with high school kids, glued to their phones, and a healthy smattering of cowboys, their hats cluttering up the tables as they waited in line for their morning brew. Jumping Beans was a classic small town joint. Everybody seemed to know everybody. Jeff found himself wondering whether Nick used to come here, and if any of the kids had been friends of his, when he saw her.
Karen Young, a nurse at the Yampa Valley Medical Center, was sitting at a table in the corner, hiding nervously behind her copy of the Steamboat Herald. She smiled at Jeff and he came over to join her.
“I didn’t know if you’d come,” Karen said, lowering her voice almost to a whisper.
“Why wouldn’t I?” Jeff smiled broadly. “I have a story to write after all. I said I’d be here, and here I am.”
Posing as an award-winning investigative journalist from New York City, Jeff had spent the last four days in Steamboat, researching a book on cowboy culture. He’d been asking a lot of questions around town about the late Blake Carter.
“The Carters were one of the oldest cowboy families in this part of the state, as I’m sure y’all are aware. Blake was the last of the line. The more y’all can tell me about him, the better.”
At first, Blake’s fellow hands up at the ranch had been happy to talk, as had his fishing buddies and the local Baptist minister. But as soon as Jeff’s questions began to focus on the accident—how thorough or otherwise the police report had been; whether a strange woman had been seen around town or up at Tracy Schmidt’s ranch in the days leading to the crash; which doctors had attended the scene—suspicions were raised. Doors began closing and locals stopped talking.
Which was why Nurse Young was so important. In a tight-knit community like this one, run on gossip but big on loyalty, Jeff knew it would be tough to find someone willing to help him. By now just about everybody at the Yampa Valley Medical Center knew better than to talk to the New York Times writer. So when Jeff caught Karen Young’s eye at Ruby’s, a local dive bar, last night, and learned she was a nurse, he’d turned up the charm to full throttle.
“I appreciate your trust in me, Karen.” Reaching under the table, Jeff squeezed her hand. “You know the very last thing on my mind is disrespecting Blake Carter’s memory. Or hurtin’ this community.”
“I know that.” Karen squeezed back.
For an older man, he really is terribly handsome, she thought.
Karen had been off older men ever since Neil—Dr. Sherridan—had broken off their affair and gone crawling back to his wife, like the snake that he was. But Jeff Stevens seemed different.
Honorable.
Interested only in the truth.
The fact that Neil might wind up in a whole heap of trouble, if it turned out Blake Carter or the boy could have been saved after all, and Jeff wrote an article about his negligence in the New York Times, shredding his reputation and destroying his career, would merely be an unavoidable by-product of the truth telling.
Karen Young was all about telling the truth.
“I’ll help you in any way I can, Jeff.” She fluttered her sky-blue eyes at Jeff. “We just have to be discreet is all.”
“Discretion is my middle name,” said Jeff, pressing his leg against Karen’s, and wondering why on earth she’d chosen to meet in a crowded coffee shop if she didn’t want people to see them together. The young lady clearly had the IQ of a bird dropping. “Of course, what would really help me . . .” He looked away suddenly, drawing back his leg and releasing her hand. “No. It’s too dangerous.”
“What?” Karen looked crestfallen. “What’s too dangerous?”
“No, no. Forget it. I couldn’t possibly ask you.”
Jeff took a big swig of his coffee and pushed his chair back, as if preparing to leave.
“Please. Just tell me!”
Jeff shook his head. “You could lose your job.”
“There are more important things than jobs,” Karen said earnestly, leaning forward to give Jeff an enhanced view of her ample cleavage. “If something bad happened to Mr. Carter or that poor boy and I stood by and did nothing, I’d never forgive myself.”
Jeff took her hands again and looked deep into her eyes.
“Karen?”
“Yes, Jeff?”
“I don’t suppose you happen to know anyone who has access to the hospital’s CCTV archives?”
The girl’s face fell. “Gosh, I . . . I don’t. I’m real sorry but I don’t know anything about security. Is there anything else you need?”
THE REST OF THE day crawled by.