Chapter 154

"Well that was a pointless meeting!" Jodi said as she was back in the car with Tess and Charlotte.

"I sort of felt like I was in school and hadn't done the reading assignment except for skipping ahead to the last chapter, but I had to participate in the class discussion anyway. You can't spoil the ending for everyone, but you don't actually know what they are discussing. It was boring, thanks for letting me come," Charlotte admitted.

"Well normally, we're actually having meaningful discussions. This was a bad example. It did serve one purpose though. It let everyone else see you, and see that you are part of Drovers Run, Charlotte," said Tess. "Jodi and I both had a hard time being taken seriously, even Claire did, and we want to prevent that for you."

"Well at least it wasn't all the way in town. I'm glad George Roop hosted it, at least he is only twenty minutes down the road," Jodi added.

"I wouldn't have minded having an excuse to go to town." admitted Tess "I would have had a handsome dinner date."

"Oh young love!" Jodi teased.

"Hey my back is actually feeling much better than it was this morning. I might be ready for an overnight visitor soon," smirked Tess.

"So how was the meeting?" Kate asked as the Wilgul girls came back.

"It was pointless. We all knew the reason behind the water loss, but couldn't say anything," Jaz responded.

"Yeah the only useful thing that happened was that Tess and Jodi introduced Charlotte as part owner of Drovers Run." Grace said "At least that's officially done."

"She looked a little bit like a deer in headlights." said Regan. "I'm glad we were all there for her first meeting."

"She's just eighteen, still a kid, really. It's not easy to just step into adult work." Jaz mentioned. "I mean I was twenty-nine when I started coaching, and some of my athletes were older than me. It was intimidating and I was eleven years older than she is now and I had my athletic resume to back me up. It's still the reason I make it a point to not have friendships with the athletes I coach. We live on the same property, but I keep things strictly professional and never hangout with the athletes. I don't want them to question my abilities or my leadership as a coach. I'm there to do a job. I keep it very separate and professional because I was a young female coach and not everyone respects that right away." she explained.

"She'll be fine, she has Tess and Jodi there to teach her anything she needs to know. A girl couldn't get much better mentors than that." Grace added.

"Yeah I learned a lot from Tess, and Jodi for that matter," admitted Kate "But while you were at the meeting pretending how to solve the problem, we were actually planning on how to fix this problem, and I think we've got it."

"It's not going to be easy, but I figured out a path that would allow us to take horses to get there, rather than hiking it, but it's a two, maybe three days ride one way." Kate said "It's hard to tell just how rugged the terrain is. I think it's likely really only two days, but I'm trying to be conservative in my projections."

"So we're looking at nearly a week round trip." said Jaz, already calculating how many appointments and sessions she would have to try to reschedule to even have a chance of going on this trip.

"Well no. If we get there and gather the evidence. I can get a search warrant and permission to enter Kinsella's property nearly immediately since they were using it as their access point and are clearly connected. We have the drone footage of the truck that proves it. We could have a horse trailer out there in a couple hours and give everyone a ride back. It's avoiding going on Kinsella's property and keeping the element of surprise that makes it so hard to get there," explained Dylan.

"Okay so two-three days then?" Jaz's mind was racing "I want to be a part of this. This is my home and they are hurting my family, my horses, my livelihood. I want to do this, but I need to sit down and meet with the coaching staff. I can't neglect my athletes. It could hurt their performance. It would ruin my reputation as a coach. I just took this weekend off as it is for your visit. I need to look at my google calendar," Jaz was planning out loud.

"Well, Dylan and I are here for the week anyway, but this would be work for us, so we're in, I'm just worried about Dylan riding for that long. Honey, you're not great on a horse," Regan cautioned

"I know, I've been worrying about that too. I did alright on the ride for Jaz, but that's nothing compared to this, and I have to be the one to be there, I'm the only one with authority to arrest and gather evidence," Dylan admitted.

"You might be the only one with power to arrest, but I gather plenty of evidence in my job everyday. I have a certain level of legal authority as the deputy director of a government environmental impact studies unit. Evidence myself and my staff gathered has been used in criminal cases plenty of times. I know proper procedures for collection of samples and things." said Regan.