Marybeth turned on her bedside lamp. “Joe, she’s going through a tough time. I can’t believe you’re acting this way.”
Joe couldn’t quit. “
“Joe, lower your voice,” Marybeth said sternly.
“ . . . and I’ve got a mother-in-law downstairs feeling sorry for herself.”
“JOE.”
He stopped and caught himself.
“I don’t need you to remind me what’s going on.” Marybeth’s eyes flashed. “What do you want me to do, throw her out into the snow? All day long I’ve been trying to blot out this . . .
Joe looked at her, noticed the tears forming in her eyes. But he was still too angry to apologize.
In a silence that was deafening, Joe got ready for bed and climbed in. She switched off the lamp, turned her back to him and he thought she was pretending to sleep. He touched her shoulder but she didn’t respond.
Joe rolled back over and stared at the ceiling and listened to the icy wind outside rattle the window.
Joe woke a few hours later, the remnants of another nightmare skittering in his head. He quietly slid out of bed and went to the window. He pressed his forehead against the cold glass and wondered how everything had gotten so bad so quickly.
Twenty-two
The next morning, Joe was eating breakfast early and alone when Marybeth came down the stairs. He could tell by the way she walked that she was still angry with him, and he watched as she went silently into his office, and came out with something in her hand and a glare in her eyes.
“You got a fax.” Her voice was not kind. “I heard it come in late last night.”
Joe winced, and reached for the single sheet.
“It’s from Elle Broxton-Howard,” Joe said, reading it.
“I know.”
“She wants to interview me. I invited her to dinner with us.”
“I figured that out.”
“This is a list of things she can’t eat. I guess she has a stack of these all made up and ready to send to people when she gets a dinner invitation.”
“Apparently.”
“Says here she doesn’t eat beef, poultry, pork, olive or canola oil, sugar, processed foods of any kind, or genetically enhanced products.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“She has a suggested menu here. Baked trout, steamed broccoli, and brown rice. Hell, we don’t have any of that stuff,” Joe said.
“No, we don’t—although I’d be happy to get it for you and your
“That’s not necessary, Marybeth.”
Marybeth turned on her heel and went up the stairs to get dressed.
Joe cursed, and crumpled the paper into a ball and flipped it toward the garbage can in the kitchen.
In a foul mood, Joe left the house and drove into the mountains on the Bighorn Road toward Battle Mountain and the Sovereign Citizen Compound. Again, McLanahan’s Blazer blocked his path. Joe eased up to it and stopped, while the sheriff’s deputy slowly climbed out into the cold to greet him.
“Still on roadblock duty, huh?” Joe asked, opening his window.
“Yes, goddammit,” McLanahan said, his teeth chattering. Twin plumes of condensation blew from his nostrils.
“Is there any traffic up here?” Joe asked. “Do the Sovereigns come and go much?”
McLanahan shook his head. “Every once in a while there’s a truck or two. But they also use Timberline Road on the other side of the mountain, so I don’t see ’em all.”
“Any activity this morning?”
“Just you,” McLanahan said. “Things pick up at night. Those two FBI guys have been through here a lot. They had quite a bit of sound equipment with them, and I guess tonight they’re planning a new phase.”
“A new phase?”
McLanahan shrugged. “Don’t ask me. They don’t tell me anything, and I’m not here at night. All I know is that that Munker guy is a real prick.”
