The next ten days was a whirlwind of activity for Lucinda as they traveled to the Waco rodeo and then on to El Paso. Roaming among the RVers, she met more competitors, their wives and children, and employees of the rodeo circuit. For the most part, everyone was friendly and helpful. And Larry, the new driver of Harris' RV, was a curiosity Lucinda couldn't ignore. He was nice, but private, never mingling with anyone even though he seemed to have encyclopedic knowledge about the sport of rodeo. And it was Larry's secrecy that had Lucinda believing he was the crux of something important. Since he'd been introduced as Larry Jones, she'd done an internet search and come up empty. Oh, there were hundreds of people named Larry Jones, but she couldn't tie any of them to rodeoing, and although she couldn't prove it, she had a suspicion that Jones was a bogus surname. Being a reporter and believing she was on to something big, she began to delve deeper into Harris' life.
Soon she was discovering things that had her mouth gaping in surprise. She'd accepted this assignment believing it would be mundane and predictable and neglected to do her homework before arriving. Researching his mother, Tooty Brightman, Lucinda discovered that she had authored two poetry books and a nonfiction love story from the 1800s under the pen name of Anna Belle. And from her age, she had been seriously young when Harris was born. Lucinda's search then landed pay dirt when she read Tooty's Wikipedia page and found out she was married to Maxwell Henry, the famous author. Lucinda couldn't believe it. She was writing a story about Maxwell Henry's son! Why hadn't Harris or Eli mentioned anything about their famous father? And if this Larry guy fit into the picture, how did he fit in? Was he just a cowboy needing a job and Harris had hired him for altruistic reasons?
Something in Lucinda's gut told her that wasn't the case.