“Of course. We share family.”
I didn’t want to feel hurt. I didn’t want to feel attracted to this man. I tried passing it off as an attraction formed from working so close together over the last several days. But I had worked with his men too and had mine for years and no attraction had ever formed. Not like this. I wanted to make this man happy. I saw the ghosts that lingered in him and I wanted to be the light that chased them away.
“We better head back. That five-a.m. start time of yours comes early,” Houston said, swinging his leg back over his bike.
Chapter Ten
Houston
I felt Amelia’s arms settle back around my waist as I started the bike back up. I knew from the moment my eyes fell on her back at Tommy’s Dead End that she could be serious trouble.
That night I had expected to take her home. Let us wreck each other’s lives and by the next morning light, or the next afternoon if I was lucky, we would be just a footnote in each other’s story. A what-if, that we both wondered about when we had a few beers and lost in the yester-years.
But now we spent almost every waking moment together. Working together and, I would never admit this to anyone, I was enjoying the work. I enjoyed the way Amelia looked when she sat atop her horse. The way that she moved as she stacked hay and the way she could drive a tractor with ease.
I liked the way she looked when she settled down helping to untangle a calf from a bit of broken fencing. The way she talked to the calf and ran her hands over his small scared frame as she cut the wire free and sprayed the wounds with disinfectant. Amelia was born to be a rancher. She was born to be on the Homeland, to be its defender.
I admired the way she wiped down her rifle every day, even though it hadn’t been shot, she kept it in immaculate condition, making sure not one finger print was left on the metal to even threaten a speck of rust.
Comfortable, that was the feeling that overcame me this last week. I had settled into the ranch, in with George and Eloise and even Susanne wasn’t as off-putting with me anymore. Comfortable in the way that Amelia poured my coffee in the morning at breakfast and how she walked out to visit me every evening, her last cup of coffee in her hands for the day, and how she offered part of it to me. She never brought me my own, but she never minded me drinking from her cup. It had become our thing.
Comfortable. Every time I had ever felt that way before I immediately got the itch to get up and go. To move on. That was the nomad way. I expected the itch to come over me at any time now. And with the lack of rustler presence since I showed up at the ranch I was wondering how much longer I would be here. I would stay until the wedding at least, and if there was no action up until then, I just wouldn’t come back.
Staying on any longer would just get complicated. Amelia was a sweet girl, the longer I stayed the more likely I was to jump over the barriers I had built for myself and when that happened, my leaving would only be harder for her. Who am I kidding, it would be that much harder for me too.
Once we turned off the highway, everything for as far as the eye could see was Homeland. The lights in the distance off a field road were suspicious. I slowed for a moment and pointed them out to Amelia.
“Your boys?” she asked.
I shook my head. “To many and too big of vehicles. Speedy and Sticky are on rotation. They should be on the other side of the property now,” they were likely the rustlers. I didn’t like the idea of checking it out with Amelia, but I knew she would insist on coming along. I made a quick call to Tommy as he and Josẽ were the closest and steered my bike to the fence line down the way and killed the lights.
“The bike will make too much noise this far from the highway and it won’t make it any further without taking the field road and I don’t want them to feel trapped,” I told her as we parked almost a quarter mile out.
“We are too far away! What if they are stealing more of my cattle?”
“At the end of the day, it’s still not worth your life. My priority is protecting you,” I knelt low to the ground and pulled my pistol from my holster that I kept under my cut. “Stay here.”
“The hell I am! I can move just as quickly and quietly as you can. If not better,” she protested. I could feel my eye twitch. Impossible woman.
“Give me your other gun.”
“I might need it.”
“Then give me the derringer in your boot,” Amelia hissed. How she even knew I kept the small .38 there I didn’t know, but I pulled it out and handed it to her. “Just because I pack a long rifle doesn’t mean I can’t wield a handgun.”
Dear God, I felt like I was arguing with Destiny.
“Move,” she ordered. We both went forward. Along the nearly dry creek bed as we listened for movement and strained to hear voices. It wasn’t the best position, but we were making good time. Hopefully, even if we didn’t stop them, we could at least get an idea of who was doing this.
Turn it into the police, or my personal vote, let me go knock heads personally. After having Amelia nestled into my back all night, I could use the physical release.
No one seemed to have spotted us when they got just below the vehicles. A dark colored newer model Ford dually hauling a large cattle trailer and a regular sized, extended Chevy diesel sat alongside each other with the Chevy facing away from us.
The drivers appeared to be in between the two vehicles and I couldn’t get a view on them. I didn’t like the idea of confronting them without backup or my bike nearby. Fighting my way out of a situation was all in a day’s work and I trusted Amelia when she said she could use the derringer, but my preferable choice was not getting into a gunfight with her.
“Let’s go!” she mouthed.
“No! Backup!” I shot back. Tommy and Josẽ should be here in a minute and they would have called Speedy and Sticky who wouldn’t be far behind.
The Fords door slammed shut and the rig was thrown in reverse. They were backing up to the cattle gate. Amelia glared at me and then chaos broke out.
Tommy and Josẽ came in hot and heavy from behind us, they tried to cut off the trucks path, but the Ford was already in motion, it had switched gears from reverse to forward and played chicken with the bikers. The two vehicles came within mere inches before Tommy and Josẽ were forced to run the ditch before hitting the truck head on. A battle they would have lost and likely cost them their lives.
The UTV slid on its driver-side door to a stop before rolling on its top just inches away from where we had been crouched down. Amelia jumped up, gun raised, trying to get a glimpse of the trucks as they sped off but to no avail in the dark and the dust.
Seconds later she rushed to my side. “Can we get them out without rolling the UTV?”
Josẽ groaned, he was on the passenger side of the ride that was sticking up in the air. He hadn’t been buckled up and, in the flip, had landed on Tommy who was wrapped up in the steering wheel.
“I think we can get Josẽ out, but it looks like Tommy’s arm might be pinned,” I muttered finishing my quick initial assessment of the situation and began ripping at the windshield.
“What do you need me to do?”
“Flag down Speedy and Sticky,” I hold her as I could hear the distant sound of the other UTV approaching.
Amelia struggled up the bank towards the field road to flag down the rest of my boys and I reached out an arm to Josẽ. “Grab on.”
Josẽ gripped my forearm and I stepped back, pulling the Hellion along behind me. I just about had him free with Speedy slid to a stop next to me and gripped Josẽ by the shoulders and with one final yank lifted him free and sat him on the ground nearby.
“Do I need to call an ambulance?” Amelia asked and Speedy and I exchanged glances.
“It’s your call Prez.”
“Wait it out. We will see how bad it is. Ambulance means cops and I don’t know the locals.”
“Houston! All they need to know it was a UTV accident. Our insurance will probably cover it!” Amelia yelled.
>
“Amelia!” I barked, and she shut up immediately and dropped to José’s side.
Speedy knelt as close to Tommy as he could. “He’s out cold but he has a strong pulse. No head bleeding that I can see or feel. His right arm is pinned though. We are going to have to flip him back over.”
“Josẽ! How are you feelin’ brother?” I called out.
“I’m fine. Dazed and sore as shit, but fine,” Josẽ answered and he struggled to sit up but Amelia pushed him back down.
“Be still and rest,” she ordered him.
“Half-Pint, get the other UTV and bring it to the edge of the bank. We are going to have to winch this back over,” I ordered, and Amelia jumped up and ran for the UTV.
Speedy looked to me, “It’s not good boss.”
“I know it’s not. Get on the phone with Sweetwater. Have Jay track down a doctor in the area, medic, nurse anybody. Does he have warrants out, anything that would put us in a bad spot?”
“I don’t think so but I’m not for sure.”
“Call my sister. She has ways of finding things out. If we can’t get medical help here ASAP, we will have to call in the locals. Any of you in trouble?”
“I’m clean,” Josẽ grumbled.
“Me too. Sticky’s on probation still,” Speedy told him as he dialed.
“Sticky can disappear if we need him to,” I told him as I hooked up the chain that Sticky threw down and Amelia’s headlights shown on the grim situation.
I finished hooking it up and Speedy got hands on Tommy the second he got off the phone with Sweetwater. He would do the best to support Tommy’s head and body as we flipped it back over as carefully as we could. I grabbed the frame of the UTV and Sticky motioned Amelia backwards.
Slowly, she winched it up, and we rolled the UTV to his side. The ride was anything but stable as Sticky jumped on top and pried open the door. The man was six-foot-two and rail thin, so he slid in the odd positioned cab and grabbed Tommy, who now groaned in response to his arm.
I finished ripping the windshield out and Speedy and I slowly took Tommy from Sticky’s arms and slid him out on the ground.
“I can take Josẽ back to the house. Get him in the bunkhouse and go for my truck and the first aid kit. We can’t leave him lie out here and we can’t get him moved in the UTV,” Amelia said as the we situated Tommy.
Sticky jumped up and Josẽ put his arm over his shoulder and the two of them got up to the UTV and put Josẽ in the passenger seat.
“I’ll be back quick as I can,” Amelia told me as I climbed the small hill to her.
I silently reached out and took the derringer from her jacket pocket and replaced it with one of my Glocks. “I don’t think they are still out there. But just in case. Be safe,” I said and on impulse pressed my lips to her forehead.
She slid in the driver’s seat, started it up and drove off.
Chapter Eleven
Amelia
I drove as fast as I could without wrecking or jarring Josẽ all over the place. Before we left the accident scene, Sticky had strapped him in for good measure this time. When we made it to the back of the bunkhouse, I wretched open the UTV door and helped Josẽ out.
“Let’s get you inside. I’ll get my mom, she’s a nurse.”
“Can’t get your mom. Not until it goes through Houston. He’s pres, it’s his call.”
“And you’re a Hellion. He’s not your president,” I shot back as I guided him into one of the three small rooms that Josẽ had pointed out to me as his bunk.
“It’s his show Amelia. I’m fine anyhow. I’ll be sore tomorrow, but I’ve been through worse,” Josẽ’s lip was already swollen and I carefully stripped him of his shirt to see the already blackening bruises that painted his upper body.
“Not on my ranch though,” I whispered as I fetched him a bottle of water, a handful of over the counter pain pills and a beer.
“Go get the medical supplies and get back to Tommy. He’s the one who needs you now. You can offer the help of your mother to Houston,” Josẽ ordered, taking the beer and the painkillers.
I jogged across the ranch yard and slipped in the back door and through the kitchen as no one was up and about this late an hour and grabbed the medical go bag from a wall cabinet in the dinning-room.
I had been gone for just over eleven minutes when I pulled my truck down the field road and slid back down on foot to where Tommy lay. Houston was sitting next to him looking exhausted. Sticky was snapping pictures of the rustlers’ tire tracks with his phone and a flashlight and Speedy was talking to someone on his cell.
“I got the medic bag. There was no time to search for anything to use as a stretcher aside from this blanket,” I passed my supplies to Houston. “You might not want me to call an ambulance, but he needs professional help. Mom’s a nurse.”
“Susanne Lorbash isn’t exactly excited about me and my men’s presence,” Houston’s voice was hard.
“And your men got hurt trying to save her family ranch from rustlers! I offered to get her for Josẽ and he declined. Said it was your call. He’s not even a Bastard he’s a Hellion!” I hissed, anger boiling in my veins. Maybe Houston was willing to risk it, but I wasn’t going to have injured or worse, dead bikers on my conscious. “I will not let your men die because you need to protect the club!”
“It’s Sweetwater, your sister,” Speedy said handing Houston the phone.
I couldn’t hear what Houston’s sister was saying but the conversation was short and not-so-sweet. Houston disconnected with a grunt and tossed Speedy the phone.
“We are okay to call in the ambulance. At the end of the day it’s just a UTV accident.”
“No,” Tommy’s voice was broken and weak but clear. “Can’t afford that shit. Just get me in bed.”
Houston and I exchanged looks. “Guess you won’t go against his wishes even if it’s for his own damn good?”
The stare off was intense. Houston wasn’t used to people challenging his authority and walking away from it. But I wasn’t going to give in either. Tommy needed helped that we alone couldn’t provide.
“Wake your mother.”
***
The worry in Mom’s voice when I called was undeniable. I rushed to explain the situation over the phone and told her to get to the bunkhouse. By the time we made it back, Mom was dressed in her scrubs and poking and prodding on Josẽ’s ribs. Houston had backed my pickup to the door and he and the Jones brothers carried Tommy into the house and laid him on the kitchen table.
I fetched a small pillow for Tommy’s head as Houston and Speedy wrestled him from his leather vest and Sticky cut the shirt from his body.
“No hospitals?” Mom asked looking from Tommy to her me and then to Houston.
“His call if we can avoid it,” Houston said, and I heard the hesitation in his voice as if he were seconding guessing himself. If we can avoid it. Houston wasn’t going to let Tommy die or become permanently injured over this.
“His arm has deep lacerations that I can stich up. It’s broken, can’t tell if it’s crushed though. Was his arm pinned?”
“Yes,” Houston admitted. “We had to roll the UTV back over to get him out. The way he was laying though it wasn’t pinned enough to lose blood flow.”
Mom went to work cleaning the bleeders on Tommy’s arms and checking his eyes while I held his hand and talked softly to him. Trying to get him to wake back up and stay awake.
“If he’s not awake and staying awake in another twenty minutes I’m calling it in Callaghan,” Mom barked in her no-nonsense voice as she slowly prodded on Tommy’s arm. “I think it’s a clean break.”
“I got splints,” Sticky offered the handmade supplies to her.
“There’s casting supplies in the barn. Animal quality but they will work,” I offered and gave Sticky the directions.
“Fear not Ms. Lorbash, this will wake him,” Houston said as he gripped Tommy’s shoulder and Mom took the other side of the break. I closed my
eyes as they yanked, admitting I wasn’t cut out for medicine, let alone rough field medicine. Tommy screamed, and his eyes flew open as the bone was set back into place.
“You’ve done this a time or two,” Mom said to Houston. It was a statement, not a question.
“I’d prefer not to talk about it. But it’s usually noses I set,” Houston said with a slight grin, I read between the lines and took it to mean he had set my brothers on more than one occasion.
Speedy and I talked to Tommy, keeping him awake as Sticky returned with the casting supplies and Mom made light work of casting his arm.
“You can buy a sling at the drugstore tomorrow. This is the strongest pain killers I have, he needs to be awake for a couple of hours, then woke every two to ward off any concussion. Same for Josẽ if you can manage. A day or two will tell but we will see,” Mom said turning back to Josẽ where she wrapped his ribs. “Just bruises but they will be tender. Rest a few days.”
“Yes ma’am,” Josẽ replied and I watched mom hand Josẽ a bottle of Jim Bean that Grandpa had kept in the living room.
“Outside now. The both of you,” she said with a glare to Houston and me.
We followed her to the back porch. Houston leaned nonchalantly against the porch railing and lit a cigarette.
“What the fuck happened out there?” Mom half hissed, half yelled.
I looked to Houston who didn’t answer. Bastard. With a small grimace, I gave Mom a quick rundown of the rustler run in.
“God, I just want this over with,” Mom said taking Houston’s cigarette from his hand. I expected her to throw it out, instead she took a drag before handing it back.
“We all do Mrs. Lorbash. And we got closer tonight. I finally agree with Amelia, this is personal to whoever is doing this. The rustlers had to have known we are on patrol. They are risking their hides on these cattle. There is a hell of a lot of beef in Texas that aren’t this well monitored,” Houston told her.
“Grandpa and Grandma both need to sit down and go through anyone who might have a grudge or want this land. Someone is trying to push us out,” I glanced down at the emergency medical bag in her hand, “I’m sorry you had to do this tonight.”
Houston Callaghan: The Devil's Bastards MC Page 7