"You're suspected of setting it, Lucky."
* * *
Chapter 5
Lucky's gaze swung toward his brother. "Did she say 'setting it'? The fire was set?"
"It was arson. No question."
"And somebody thinks I set it?" Lucky snorted incredulously. "Why in hell would I do that?"
"For the insurance money."
Lucky's disbelieving gaze moved around the room, lighting briefly on all four faces, which were watching him closely to gauge his reaction. "What is this, April Fool's Day? This is a joke, right?"
"I wish to hell it was."
Chase leaned forward and folded his hands around his coffee mug as though he wanted to strangle it. His light gray eyes shone fervently in his strong face. He was as handsome as his younger brother, but in a different way. While Lucky had the reckless nonchalance of a cowboy of a century ago, Chase had a compelling intensity about him.
"I couldn't believe Pat would even suggest such a thing," he said.
"Pat! Sheriff Pat Bush? Our friend?" Lucky exclaimed. "I saw him yesterday evening at the place."
"And that was the last anybody saw of you."
"We heard all about your fight with Little Alvin and that scummy Patterson character," Sage said. "People said you were fighting over a woman."
"Exaggeration. They were moving in on her. She didn't welcome their advances. All I did was step in." He gave them a condensed version of the altercation. "You would have done the same thing, Chase."
"I don't know," he remarked dubiously. "It would take some kind of woman to get me in a tussle with those two."
Lucky sidestepped the reference to Dovey. "Jack Ed got me with his knife. That's how my shirt got ripped."
"He came at you with a knife!"
"Don't worry, Mother, it was nothing. Just a scratch. See?" He raised his bloodstained shirt, but the sight of the long, arcing cut across his middle didn't relieve Laurie.
"Did you have it seen to?"
"In a manner of speaking," he grumbled, remembering how badly it had stung when Dovey poured whiskey along the length of the cut.
"Who was the woman you fought over?" Sage asked. Her brothers' escapades with women had always been a source of fascination to her. "What happened to her?"
"Sage, I don't think that's significant," her mother said sharply. "Don't you have something els
e to do?"
"Nothing this interesting."
Lucky was unmindful of their conversation. He was watching his brother and gleaning from Chase's somber expression that the situation wasn't only interesting, but critical.
"Pat can't possibly believe that I started a fire, especially in one of our own garages," Lucky said, shaking his head to deny the preposterous allegation.
"No, but he warned me that the feds might."
"The feds? What the hell have the feds got to do with it?"
"Interstate commerce. Over fifty thousand dollars' worth of damage," Chase said, citing the criteria. "A fire at Tyler Drilling qualifies for an investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Pat stuck his neck out by warning me what to expect. It doesn't look good, Lucky. We're in hock at the bank. Since Grandad Tyler started the company, business has never been as bad as it is now. Each piece of equipment is insured to the hilt." He shrugged. "To their way of thinking, it smells to high heaven."