"You're sure?"
Kenn didn't look away. "I must be. I'm risking my new place here on it, right?"
Adrian cocked an eyebrow and looked at him flatly, "Yes, you are. The bowling alley in Kemmerer?"
"Yeah, Sage Lanes. It could snow for a week and we'd be okay there," Kenn said, not hesitating, still seeing the snow-covered vehicles in his mind. Not one, but two. Angie wasn't alone.
The other three men clearly wanted to question, but didn't because they also knew that only Adrian's decision really mattered. They could feel him weighing it, even as all five of them turned to watch money - a large number of twenties - go blowing by with the gusty Wyoming wind. Two of them still felt the natural urge to gather it up, despite its uselessness.
Adrian looked around. They had a great view of the Rocky Mountains, where grizzly bear and elk were no doubt hiding from the survivors, but down here in the basin, there were bodies of lizards and gophers scattered among the mesquite shrubs and cactus with their yellow and red tinged flowers, and not a single tree in sight. There were barbed wire fences, rows of unturned fields, and garbage littering the area, but as for civilization, there were only the distant outlines of two farms, and they looked boarded up, like they'd been condemned before the War had come. No other shelters. They were very exposed to the weather here, and if his Marine was right about the snow, they were in danger.
"Notebooks open. Plans have changed."
They did it reluctantly. A Gulf War Veteran, a State Trooper, and a Mobster getting a taste of crow, Kenn thought.
"We'll need all three generators, a full fuel truck, the big tool chest, and a crew for bathroom setups, since those scheduled for here already did theirs." He looked at Kenn, not scowling like he wanted to, when the wind blew a fresh wave of recent decay over their table. "You'll do the hookups?"
Kenn nodded, and Adrian lit a smoke. "Good. Go spend some time on the radio. Tell Mitch and Matt I want them."
Kenn moved right away, figuring 'he heard it while monitoring the CB' would be his excuse to the camp. While he was glad he hadn't had to lie to Adrian yet, he knew the questions would come and he would need to have an answer ready.
The camp around them now murmuring, watching. Adrian gave his closest men understanding looks, sure their light beards hid suspicion and dislike. "I know you don't trust him and that's all right, as long as you trust me. Do you?"