Chapter 16: The Trip To Town

As she put the last bite of food in her mouth Marie pushed back away from the table and started to load the dishwasher. She latched the door closed and turned it on. "Come on Honey, let's get dressed."

"I am dressed." Marie realized when she heard the tone of his voice he was serious.

"Jesse, you can't go Christmas shopping looking like a common ranch hand." She took a deep breath, "Jesse..." She paused a moment, then realized there was nothing else to say.

"Hon, I am a common ranch hand. I am not a gentleman. I am a rancher and that is all I want to be. If you think you can civilize me, you better think different," he told her. His face looked as if it was carved from a block of granite. She didn't answer.

His face broke out in a soft smile as he added, "Cowgirl, you better not figure on wearing any of that eastern wear. Well, not unless you plan on me carrying you out to the pickup. We better take it because it has a higher center than your Jeep and still has a load of sand in the back."

"Okay, Cowboy, if you say so. But what is the sand for?" She smirked at him as she waited for some dumb joke she would not understand.

"On slick roads the added weight in the back presses the rear tires down so we get better traction. It helps keep us on the road." He noticed her smirk. "What?"

"I'm waiting for the punch line so I can give you a dutiful laugh," she told him.

"Sweet Bones, there is no joke." He hugged her. "You want to dress up, go put your new boots on."

"Oh how I have fallen on hard ways," she moaned and raised the back of her hand to her brow in a dramatic gesture. "In college I once debated with myself whether or not to call in sick when my red and green tartan outfit did not come back from the cleaners. Now, here today, my worry is that I wear boots so I don't get my tush packed with snow."

"Your tush and your bush," he corrected her. "If they both get filled with snow you freeze up inside and become an frigid old maid. Go get fancied up and let's go. Sun up is in another hour and I want us to be well on our way by then." He gave her a gentle smack on the butt.

"Your wish is my command, oh Master," she laughed at him.

While Marie hurried to get dressed in warm clothing, Jesse emptied the cache of three fruit jars under the counter next to the sink, all filled with "found" money. He grinned that Marie was not aware of just how many fruit jars filled with cash he had stored away in different places. He slipped on a parka, shoved the wads of cash into the inner pockets of his parka and hurried out to the barn. Billy was cleaning the milk separator. "What's up, Boss?" he asked.

"Marie and I are going into the city and maybe on in to Laramie later. We will probably be gone for about three days at the most, unless something happens. While we're gone, I want you to think of someone you can work with. Our grateful government, as a reward for our honorable and wonderful sacrifice, has permitted us to attend an auction of property confiscated under the drug laws.

"I haven't even told Marie about this yet. The property to be auctioned off is your old outfit to the south of us." He laughed at Billy's look of surprise. "Here's the way it works, The place goes up for bid in a closed auction that only qualified bidders get to attend. The only qualified bidders are Marie and I."

Billy looked at his boss in confusion. "Ah, when does this private auction come off?"

"Oh, some time yesterday or this morning. We did not even have to be there to attend." Jesse looked at Billy's confusion. "It's a set up. Because of some errors on the FBI's part, that California bunch and the crooked New Yorkers almost got away with the biggest drug deal in US history."

"You mean that airplane loaded with dope?" Billy asked. "I never thought there was that much of that stuff in the whole world, let alone on that ranch.

"Yeah," Jesse told him. You might run into another batch or two they missed. If that happens, you are to call the FBI direct and talk to them. Don't bother calling me first. Don't call the locals or the DEA, just the FBI. Then you call me."