Chapter Thirteen

 

 

 

“The Raines family has refused to negotiate. We ask that you consider allowing this case to proceed through the court system, Your Honor.”

Olivia looked at the judge. He remained impassive, though his friendship with Creek Bend’s mayor made her suspicious of the man’s intentions. Still, this was only the first official hearing—the one that would decide whether or not the county would take up the township’s fight and push it all the way to the state courts. Though it wasn’t much comfort, Olivia reminded herself that she still had time to appeal, if the worst came to pass.

“Let’s hear the arguments, then,” the judge mumbled.

Mayor Wiggins himself stood before the bench, putting his law degree to good use, appearing sober and thoughtful, more than concerned for both his constituents and the environment. Olivia tried to breathe through the illness rising inside her, working its way north, burning her throat. The heat reached all the way up to her tear ducts and scorched them until she couldn’t even cry to relieve the pressure.

Considering that she was sitting in a courtroom listening to Wiggins’ discourse on the evils of the local oil industry, she figured not breaking down into tears was a good thing—no matter how few people were present at the hearing. Besides, she’d already cried a river over the past month. Too bad Creek Bend couldn’t use her misery as their new water source.

“They come with their rigs and tear up the land!” the mayor extolled dramatically. “Pipes burst. The water would be poisoned…”

In all honesty, Olivia couldn’t have agreed with the man more. She had many concerns about the integrity of the environment in the immediate vicinity. And nature was her bread and butter, the biggest draw the Raines Ranch had for its guests. The last thing she’d want—in the normal course of events—was a series of exploratory wells on land adjacent to hers. The eyesore alone would certainly hurt her business, but the wildcatters were far preferable to shutting down completely.

Of course, that point would be moot if Wiggins won his case.

“We know the land will be left to Cody O’Neal. We also know that Eugene is at a point in his life where the burden of such a large property is entirely beyond his ability to manage.”

“Objection, your honor.” Olivia’s attorney got to his feet. “Mayor Wiggins can’t possibly know that Eugene O’Neal is, as he posits, at a point in his life where the ability to manage his own property is an unbearable burden. Mayor Wiggins is not a doctor, nor has he spoken to Eugene O’Neal since before his hospitalization. He has no way of knowing Mr. O’Neal’s medical state.”

Wiggins scowled. “The man had a stroke! The gossip in this town—”

“Hearsay is inadmissible,” Olivia’s attorney interjected. “The law prevents Mr. O’Neal’s doctors from discussing their patient’s medical progress with the mayor of the town.”

“Let me rephrase,” Wiggins suggested acidly. “Eugene will have a very difficult time of just getting around on his own after his medical emergency, which may or may not be life-altering in a way that would suggest the man had a stroke.”

“How could—?”

“I come to this conclusion on my own, simply on the basis that the man is still in the hospital’s rehabilitation center two months after said emergency.” Wiggin’s nostrils flared with the force of his inhalation. “Of course, his grandson, Cody, the only relative left in the country to take over at the Double O, will pick up the reins. Unfortunately, Cody has already met with three oil companies. They’ve all made offers.”

Wiggins droned on, but Olivia hardly paid attention. She tried to, but she was beyond exhausted. Quite frankly, just hearing his name was painful, and the mayor tossed it around as if the sound of the syllables didn’t draw blood in the deepest part of her chest.

“The O’Neals have made it abundantly clear, Your Honor, that they fully intend to…”

Once again, Olivia let the swirl of legal jargon and Wiggins’ postulations fly past her. After all, everyone knew what the arguments were. Everyone in town had been keeping up on the gossip—about Eugene, the Double O, the Raines Ranch, and how everything tied in to their own wellbeing. Some people had been genuinely supportive of Olivia’s resistance to eminent domain seizure, while others had told her to her face that she was being selfish for fighting back.

It had been a hard month. A very hard month.

“The law”—Wiggins paused dramatically, tearing Olivia’s attention away from her own wretched thoughts—“says eminent domain can be employed for the benefit of the public. As I have laid out, Your Honor, the O’Neals are selling their land to an oil company. The company will destroy the resource we have such a need for, which is the exact opposite of the public’s benefit.”

Olivia’s attorney shook his head. “Judge, the Raines Ranch, and even the property adjacent, belonging to the O’Neal family, simply doesn’t have enough water to sustain an entire town. To think otherwise is completely unreasonable. What passes through that stream amounts to little more than a trickle, only adequate enough to keep the cows alive.”

“Cows and two ranches!” Wiggins argued. “Even during the Thirties, when the drought severely impacted this area, that stream still ran with clear, clean water.”

“If it was enough for the whole town’s use, Creek Bend would have seized it then, when it was so desperately needed for survival.” Olivia’s lawyer stepped toward the bench, obviously attempting to foster a sense of camaraderie with the judge—a man who spent a great deal of social time in the mayor’s company. “Your Honor, the townspeople would go through the small amount of water there in less than a month, with no way for the spring to replenish itself in a timely fashion. It’s not a spigot. We must wait for nature to take its course.”

Wiggins would not be deterred. “Considering what else is on offer around these parts, that stream is a major tributary. And even if, by some stretch of the imagination, we came to the conclusion that Creek Bend would not be able to actually use the water, we still need to protect it from the encroachment of Big Oil. The town has no choice but to create a safety zone to keep the water from being polluted and running down into the river. The water treatment facility would never be able to handle those sorts of contaminants.”

“Yes, I’ve read your reports.” The judge heaved a sigh and sat up from his slouch against the thick, leather cushions of his chair. He adjusted his glasses and shifted a few papers around. “As a resident of this community, I am also alarmed by the idea that our drinking water might be rendered poisonous sometime in the foreseeable future. However, I still have no evidence that the O’Neal family is selling their land.”

“So far,” Olivia’s attorney said, “there isn’t any. I’ve spoken directly with Eugene O’Neal, and he has yet to transfer ownership rights to his grandson. His signature would be required for any sale or lease of the Double O’s acreage and, to date, that has not been given.”

The judge sighed again and pulled a very serious face at Olivia. Then he glanced back at her lawyer. “Has anyone been in contact with Cody O’Neal?”

“No, sir, but I have left him messages and sent him the information regarding this hearing—both email and snail mail.”

“But he’s not here?”

“Uh, it appears not, Your Honor.”

The judge stared at Olivia. “You haven’t heard from him, Miss Raines?”

Willing her inability to manufacture tears to hold out a little longer, Olivia shook her head. It took two tries to put her actions into words. “No, sir.”

“Have you even spoken to Mr. O’Neal on the subject?”

Pressure grew behind her eyes. “Yes, I have. He was concerned with securing a future for his grandfather, to make him comfortable.”

“Did he mention that he was selling the Double O?”

Olivia’s lawyer answered before she could. “Whether or not they discussed the sale of the Double O can’t be taken into account, when there has been no sale of the Double O.”

“And there won’t be.”

Olivia’s stomach squeezed into a tight little ball at the familiar voice. Her eyes suddenly awash in the tears she’d so recently denied, she turned toward the rear entrance of the courtroom. Cody stood next to a man in an expensive suit and a bold power tie.

The unknown man lifted a packet of papers and raised his voice so that it rang out in the room. “I represent the O’Neal family, on behalf of the Great Gas & Petrol Company. I have the agreement for land usage drawn up between those two parties. There is a clearly marked buffer zone between the region the company is interested in drilling and the stream. In fact, the Double O’s house stands between them, and there are laws governing how much land must be dedicated to the rig, anyway.”

Olivia’s lawyer jumped into action. “In other words, Your Honor, they have a set amount of land they can occupy, thereby minimizing any damage a potential leak could cause.”

“Yes, I understood that.” The judge glared at him for a long moment before looking toward the other attorney. “Let me see the paperwork.”

The two men came forward. Olivia was thankful she hadn’t eaten lunch—or breakfast, for that matter—because with every step Cody took in her direction, she grew less confident in her ability to hold it down. Her stomach rioted, her heart thumped and her ears rang. She felt as if her lungs couldn’t work properly.

A whole, miserable month had passed since she’d seen him. She’d screwed up, acting with untamed emotion, lashing out without thought to the consequences. She hadn’t even considered Cody’s feelings—or his pride. Olivia had confessed the entire sordid tale to Eugene, and he’d told her to have faith, but the days had dragged into weeks and still she hadn’t heard from Cody.

He was there now. He looked tired, a little thinner than she remembered, but there was a spark of militant determination in his eye that she’d seen before—the day he’d tossed her out of his home and life.

Sitting in her seat was torture. The minutes stretched into timelessness as he approached, but then Cody stopped at her side and caught her hand. He squeezed her fingers and held on. Her entire body burned with some emotion she couldn’t define, but for the first time in weeks, Olivia’s lungs started working properly.

“We’ll take a few minutes so I can read this over.” The judge glanced at his watch. “Be back in here by a quarter to.”