Another Solution (Crowley County Series Book 4)

  Another Solution

  T. E. Killian

  Christ Centered Ministries

  Cottonwood, Arizona

  Copyright © 2014 by Trennis E. Killian

  Cover Design: Kailee J. Jodarski

  Novels by T. E. Killian

  The Sycamore P.D. Series

  Lost Memories

  Accepted Memories

  Resolved Memories

  The Crowley County Series

  No Easy Solution

  A Better Solution

  The Only Solution

  Another Solution

  The Clear Creek Series

  Ryan’s Ruin

  Chase’s Return

  Hunter’s Revenge

  Walking Together Series

  Walking Straight

  Walking Away

  Walking the Line

  www.tekillian.com.

  Another uplifting Christian novel series from the author of the Sycamore P.D. Series.

  Crowley County Series

  Join the people of Crowleyville as they face the challenges of small town life while struggling to welcome an influx of newcomers.

  Another Solution – Fourth in the Series

  In this last book of the series, Jason Walker is a sergeant with the county sheriff’s department. He has been in love with Karen Bierstadt for a year but she has held him back because she needed to get over being literally left at the altar three years before.

  Now, Karen is finally ready to give Jason a chance but things happen in both their lives to hinder their building a relationship.

  With the help of Jason’s granny, they come together only to be pulled apart as they both have to face dangerous adversaries before they will ever have a chance to be together.

  Chapter One

  Most people loved Friday because it was the last day of their workweek but not Jason Walker. He loved Friday because it was the first day of his three days off every week. Yeah, he loved his schedule. Even though ten hour days did get kind of long sometimes, the three day weekend almost always made up for it.

  Jason loved his job as well. He knew lots of guys in law enforcement who only stayed in it because they had too many years in to quit. They didn’t want to lose their retirement benefits. But not Jason. He liked almost every aspect of being a Crowley county deputy sheriff. If he thought about it though, much of that was due to his good friend Floyd McCracken being the sheriff.

  Jason and Floyd had grown up together with Floyd being a couple of years older. Then they’d been detectives together back when Floyd’s uncle had been the sheriff. In fact, they had been partners on most of the cases they worked on.

  On this Friday, Jason was driving out to his granny’s house or rather farm. She owned several hundred acres but only about half of it was farmland. His gramps had begun leasing out all their farmland long before he died five years ago. So now, Granny just kept up the area around the house and Jason tried to do most of that on his Fridays and Saturdays. He always did more than what she told him she wanted done. He knew that if he didn’t do those extra things she would.

  He didn’t want her doing any of the outside chores anymore even though she seemed to be in perfect health. She certainly was quick to tell everyone including her doctor that she was fit as a fiddle. But he knew she was in her early seventies and therefore would be more susceptible to things going wrong with her health the older she got. And he intended to take good care of her no matter what.

  After all, she and his gramps had raised him since his mother died when he was two. They had always loved him and treated him like both a son and a grandson. He had to smile when he thought about it though. He had always received the best parts of being a son and the best parts of a grandson, never any of the bad.

  Sure Granny came across as a gruff, cantankerous old woman to most people but Jason knew she had a heart as big as all outdoors.

  He knew one of the things he’d have to do right away was to fix the fence around the chicken coop. Granny insisted on keeping a large flock of chickens both layers and fryers. And he for one was glad she did for she made the best fried chicken in the county and he also loved to benefit from some of her huge breakfasts whenever he could.

  As soon as he pulled into the yard, he noticed that Granny was sitting in her rocker on the porch. He cherished that picture from his childhood. Except back then Gramps had always been sitting in the identical rocker to her left.

  When he jumped out of his pickup, climbed the steps, and sat in Gramps’ rocker, he wasn’t surprised to see a steaming cup of coffee sitting on his side of the small table between them. She was sipping her own cup.

  Granny always knew when he’d be there and would always have either coffee in the mornings or iced tea at other times of the day setting there waiting for him.

  He smiled over at her and said, “Good morning Granny. How are you today?”

  She made a loud harrumphing sound and while still looking out at the woods behind Jason’s truck said, “Not a good morning. No not a good morning at all.”

  He waited knowing that she would finish when she was ready and not before, no matter what he said or did.

  “That blame Dickens boy ran over my flower bed with the wagon again.”

  Jason tried not to laugh. He knew Granny would whop him one if he did. Part of the lease to one of the local farmers, Richard Dickens, included the use of the barn. Jason knew Richard quite well since he was a deacon at the Baptist church where they were members.

  He also knew that before Richard leased the barn, the flowerbed in question didn’t exist. He was sure that Granny had put it there almost in the way of any machinery coming out of the barn. She seemed to thrive on fussing at others. But he was used to it and loved her in spite of it or maybe even because of it.

  “Did you call Richard and tell him?”

  She didn’t say anything for a moment then jerked her head back. “Did.”

  Jason waited some more.

  “Said he and his wife would come over this afternoon and fix the damages to it.”

  Jason did smile then. “Well, won’t that make things all right?”

  She crossed her arms over her chest and growled, “Won’t be the same. Still have to go out and do it myself after they leave.”

  Jason did laugh then and drew a stern look from his granny. He knew better than to continue that conversation. So he finished his coffee, stood, and said, “I guess I’d better get started on that chicken coop. Don’t want any of those critters getting loose now do we? I’m afraid Ole Sandy might have a little too much fun chasing them.

  Sandy was his gramps’ old coonhound and at the sound of his name, the dog came trotting around the corner of the house to investigate.

  Granny looked over at the dog and said, “No chicken feathers hanging from his mouth. Good thing for him.”

  As he was walking toward the chicken coop, Jason laughed at the gruff way she talked about the old dog. But he knew she loved that dog if nothing else but because he had been Gramps’ hunting dog.

  Jason had just finished fixing the chicken coop and had started on the fence around Granny’s garden when she called him in for lunch.

  Once he was seated at the large kitchen table across from Granny’s chair, Jason leaned back and watched her as she set the cold cuts, cheese, and homemade bread on the table.

  Homemade bread was one of the things he missed about not living out there anymore. He’d moved into an apartment in town when he’d first hired on with the sheriff’s department. Then a couple of years later, he’d bought a townhouse where he still lived by himself.

  Granny interrupted his thought
s. “Been watching you at church. You been giving the eye to that young thing that works at the hospital pert near a year now.”

  Jason wasn’t surprised at that statement. He knew Granny was one of the most observant people around. Still, he knew better than to respond to such a baited statement so he waited knowing Granny wasn’t finished anyway.

  “Like her looks. Why don’t you ask her out?”

  He chuckled. “I did and she shot me down . . . big time.”

  “Is that all?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did she give you a reason, something you can wait on for her to change her mind?”

  He wasn’t really sure he wanted to answer that question. He knew from experience though that she’d just keep after him until he did anyway.

  “Yeah, she said she wasn’t dating anyone for a while. It seems that a few years ago she was supposed to be getting married but the guy never showed up at the church.”

  Granny snorted. “Your grandpa would’ve hung a polecat like that from the barn rafters by his thumbs.”

  “I agree with you on that one. But the biggest problem, at least for me, is that the guy was a cop.”

  “Oh!”

  “Yeah. But she did say that when she had worked it all out she would possibly go out with me.”

  “Well, what you waiting for then?”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Don’t you know that when a woman says maybe then you keep asking until she finally says yes?” “And she will, eventually.”

  All afternoon Jason thought about what Granny had said at lunch and by three o’clock, he had just about decided to try Karen again the first chance he got.

  * * *

  When Karen Bierstadt finished with her eleven o’clock appointment, she remembered that she had slept late that morning and therefore hadn’t packed a lunch.

  She laughed at herself. A psychologist would call that a Freudian Slip because she really wanted to have lunch with her best friend, Daisy Bates. Daisy was a nurse at a doctor’s office just outside the physical therapy entrance of the hospital.

  She grabbed her cell phone hoping that Daisy didn’t already have other plans. Daisy agreed immediately.

  They met in the parking lot and jumped into Karen’s car for the short drive to the BFF Coffee Shop.

  Karen took a second to look at her relatively new friend. Daisy was just a little shorter than Karen’s five feet five inches but more rounded. Karen envied Daisy her shape. She had always been thin and athletic whereas Daisy had a shape that turned heads. But the thing that Karen thought really set Daisy off from other women was her beautiful thick brown hair that had natural red and blond highlights mixed through it. That was such a contrast to Karen’s own long black hair that she kept up or in a ponytail for work.

  No wonder Jason had asked Daisy out when she first moved to Crowleyville. How could Karen compete with women like Daisy? Whoa, where did that thought come from? Who said she wanted to compete with anyone for Jason? And just why did his name even come up anyway?

  As they walked through the coffee shop door, Sue Ann McCracken who was nine months pregnant called out to them from her position on a stool behind the counter. “Is that table in the corner okay ladies?”

  She pointed to the only empty table in the place.

  As they took their seats, Karen was glad she had a whole hour for her lunch and she knew Daisy did too.

  Jo Turner came flying by, placed menus in front of them and said, “I’ll be right back to take your orders girls.”

  Karen really liked both of the women who owned the coffee shop together. Sue Ann was the sheriff’s wife and had owned a beauty shop before. Jo Turner was the wife of the pastor at Karen’s church. She envied the two women their strong friendship. They had been best friends since first grade thus the name of the shop which most people simply called Best Friends.

  After Jo took their orders a few minutes later, Daisy turned to Karen with a serious look on her face and said, “Mike asked me a curious question last night, one I hadn’t thought about for some time.”

  Karen wasn’t sure what was coming next. Daisy’s husband was a high school teacher but he hadn’t always been one though. He’d been an undercover DEA agent who had been shot a year and a half ago. The bullet had lodged near his spine causing him to be paralyzed for six months before they’d finally been able to go in and get it out. He’d been a patient of Karen’s in PT and was now walking quite well.

  Daisy continued, “He asked me about you and Jason Walker. He reminded me that you told Jason almost a year ago that you would eventually be able to go out on dates again and you might go out with him when you did.”

  Karen knew where this was going but didn’t want to say anything just yet.

  “Well?”

  Karen tried to pretend that she didn’t know what Daisy meant but that didn’t work. Daisy just glared at her with a half-smile on her face until Karen answered her.

  “I guess you could say that I’ve been thinking about that a little bit lately.”

  When she didn’t continue, Daisy prompted her. “And . . . ?”

  “And I guess I’m about as ready as I’ll ever be.” She quickly added. “But I’m still afraid or at the least nervous.”

  Daisy smiled, reached across to pat Karen’s hand, and said, “That’s okay, Karen. There are ways to get around that fear.”

  Karen was surprised at Daisy’s casual comment. “There are?”

  “Sure there are.” She seemed to think for a moment then said, “Why don’t you and Jason go on a double date with Mike and me tonight?”

  Karen laughed. “But you’re married. You don’t go out on dates . . . do you?”

  Daisy was nodding her head before Karen finished. “We sure do. When Mike and I got married, we decided that we never wanted to lose the magic that was there when we were dating. So we agreed to go out on a date, just the two of us, at least once a month. Lucy is okay with that because when we don’t take her with us, Mike’s mom keeps her at the home. Not only does Lucy love Sarah but she also gets to spend time there with Bert and all the rest.”

  Karen remembered that before she took the job at the clinic where she was now, Daisy had been the director of the Sparrow Foundation Home for Challenged Adults.

  Daisy suddenly giggled. “Oh no you don’t Karen. You’re not going to get me off track here. Why don’t you try it? A double date would be the perfect way for you to ease back into dating.”

  She giggled again. “And there’s no one more perfect to start with than Jason Walker. Don’t you agree?”

  Karen wasn’t going to answer that question. If she said yes, it might sound too much like a commitment of some sort. And even if she did go out with them the way Daisy was suggesting, she didn’t want Jason to get the wrong idea.

  Daisy was still giving her a pleading look so she relented and said, “Okay, I will go along with you and Mike tonight and if Jason just happens to go too, then fine.”

  She thought quickly. “But I’m not going to call him.”

  Daisy laughed this time and said, “Don’t worry about that part. I’ll give Mike a call in a little while. He’ll be glad to call Jason and you know that Jason will jump at the opportunity.”

  She touched Karen’s arm. “Mike says that you’re all Jason ever wants to talk about. So I just know that Jason will come along too.”

  When Karen started to deny it, Daisy shook her head vigorously. “That poor boy’s been half in love with you since the first time he saw you. You should hear the way Mike describes that first day when Jason pushed Mike’s wheelchair into PT and he saw you.”

  Karen tried to laugh along with Daisy but couldn’t quite manage it. What had she just gotten herself into? Was it too late to call it off?

  * * *

  Jason had just finished repairing the garden fence and was talking to Richard and his wife Naomi when his cell phone rang. He quickly looked at the caller ID. He didn’t real
ly want to go in on his day off. But since he’d finally allowed Floyd to promote him to sergeant, that happened much more than before.

  He was relieved when he saw that it was Mike Bates.

  “Hey Mike what’s up?”

  Mike laughed and Jason wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that laugh until Mike started talking.

  “What’s the one thing you’ve been hoping would happen for almost a year now?”

  Jason knew what Mike was talking about immediately. His so-called best friend, as well as Floyd, and a few of the other guys at the department had been ribbing him about his infatuation for Karen Bierstadt all that time.

  “Hey man, you’d better not be pulling my leg now.”

  Mike seemed to sober up on the other end of the line. “No joking here . . . at least not this time. Daisy called me a little while ago and said that she had lunch with Karen and she was able to talk Karen into going on a double date with the three of us tonight . . . if you’re available that it.”

  Jason felt like shouting, dancing, or something else equally outrageous. Was his dream finally coming true? After all, Karen had become his dream girl over the past year.

  He still couldn’t believe it. “Okay, you said you’re not kidding but would Daisy?”

  “No way man. Daisy was almost as excited as you are.”

  When Jason didn’t respond to that, Mike said, “Well are you?”

  Jason was still thinking about how much he’d wanted this very thing for so long. “Am I what?”

  “Are you going with us you dope?”

  Jason almost shouted into the phone. “Of course I am. When . . . where?”

  “Daisy and I will pick you up a little before six and then we’ll swing around to the other side of the complex to Karen’s townhouse. That okay with you?”

  “Sure it is. I’ll see you then.”

  He disconnected and just stood there grinning until Richard said, “Are you okay Jason?”