Soldier's Duty (Iron Horse Legacy Book 1)

by Elle James

  She shook her head. “I just got back to town. Heard what?”

  “My father is missing. All the McKinnon brothers are back to help find him.”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh, sweet Jesus, I’m so sorry.” She reached out to touch his arm. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

  “I don’t think so. We have a lot of people looking for him.”

  She continued to shake her head. “You and your family have enough to contend with. You don’t need to be bothered with our problems. I’ll manage without your help.” Bree turned toward the fence. “If you don’t mind the cattle being here, I’ll bring them back to our ranch as soon as I take care of the toxins.”

  Angus grabbed her arm and pulled her back to face him. “Bree,” he said, the feel of her name on his lips bringing back a slew of memories he’d thought he’d forgotten. “My mother needs something…no, someone…to keep her mind off my father’s disappearance. Please, let her help you. And it won’t take long to get your animals off the property.”

  She stared down at the hand on her arm. “I don’t want to get in the way of you finding your father.”

  He gave her a fleeting half of a smile. “They have the National Guard, the sheriff’s department and the Montana Search and Rescue people all looking for my father. Between all of us, we’ll find him. In the meantime, let us help you and your mother.”

  Again she chewed on her lip and finally nodded. “I can’t do it alone.”

  “No, you can’t,” he said. “And you can’t stay at Wolf Creek until the poison has been found.”

  “I found a bag of rat poison in the creek above the house and barn.”

  “You can’t stay at the ranch house until the poison has been neutralized. And you might not have found all of it.” He narrowed his eyes and gave her a stern glance. “You’re staying with us. I’ll go back with you to your house to collect your things.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” she said. “I can get there on my own.”

  His lips firmed. “I want to see where you found the bag of poison. What if whoever dumped it there decides to strike again? Your neighbors, hell, everyone in a one-hundred-mile radius needs to know what to be on the lookout for. We could all have the same problem and not yet know it.”

  “I suppose you’re right.” She shot a glance toward his horse. “I don’t want you to risk your horse’s health by taking him over there.

  Angus glanced around and noticed the helmet on the ground. “How did you get here? Four-wheeler?”

  She nodded.

  Before she could protest, he took the bridle off his horse and smacked his butt, sending him toward the barn. “Go on!” he called out.

  “Why did you do that?” Bree asked.

  “He’ll find his way home. It’s feeding time.”

  “Are you walking all the way back to your place?”

  He shook his head. “No, I’m riding with you.”

  Chapter 5

  All the air left Bree’s lungs. “Riding with me?” she squeaked.

  He nodded. “Yes, ma’am.” He scooped the helmet and wool cap from the ground and fitted them over her head, looping the helmet’s strap beneath her chin. “Come on. We’ll run out of daylight before too long. We need to get the animals to safety before then.” He started toward the four-wheeler on the other side of the fence. As he walked, he waved his hands, shooing the cattle away from the gap and deeper into Iron Horse Ranch.

  “But…” Bree said, knowing she might as well be spitting in the wind.

  Angus wasn’t listening. He hadn’t changed all that much after all. Back when they’d been kids, he’d get an idea in his head and there was no talking him out of it. Her lips twitched. Jumping off the cliff at the lake had been one of those crazy ideas that could have gotten him killed. But he’d survived, and she’d lost a couple years off her life worrying about him.

  She followed a little more slowly. The thought of riding double on a four-wheeler with Angus was too much. How was she supposed to keep her distance from him when their bodies would be bounced against each other all the way back to the ranch? The ride would take well over thirty minutes.

  Her heart skipped several beats, and her pulse pounded hard against her eardrums.

  Angus nodded toward the ATV. “Do you want to drive, or do you want me to do the honors?”

  All Bree could thing was, Which way would spur the least amount of desire?

  Sweet Jesus, how was she going to hold it together? Should she ride in the back with her arms around his waist, or have him right in the back with his arms around her waist? Both options were going to kill her either way.

  “I’ll drive,” she said and slipped her leg over the seat.

  Angus settled on the seat behind her, but he didn’t wrap his arms around her waist. Not that it mattered. His thighs enveloped hers, making her warm in the freezing wind.

  She started the engine and hit the throttle, jerking the four-wheeler into motion.

  Suddenly, Angus flew off the back of the vehicle.

  She barely had time to feel the cold on her legs, before Angus ran, leapfrogged onto the seat and grabbed her around the middle. This time, he held on tightly, his chest pressed to her back, his thighs clamped around hers.

  Bree’s breath caught and held in her lungs. Thirteen years melted away. For a moment, she felt as if they were the teens who’d roamed the countryside on horseback and four-wheelers, laughing, smiling and loving each other like there was no tomorrow.

  Angus’s arms shifted, and his hands clamped over hers, just in time to jerk the handlebars and keep them from running headlong into a tree.

  Crap! She had to get her head on straight, or she’d kill them both. Bree wrapped her gloved fingers around the handles and squared her shoulders. They weren’t teenagers anymore. They’d gone in two different directions—Angus into the Army, Bree to Alaska to avoid being charged with the murder of her stepfather.

  She had to remember that and not fall in love all over again with Angus.

  Sadly, she suspected she’d never fallen out of love with the man, and likely never would.

  Doing her best to focus on the task at hand, she steered the ATV toward the pasture closer to the ranch house. Soon, she crossed the cattle guard and pulled to a stop beside the creek where she’d found the bag of arsenic.

  Angus slid off the back and held out his hand to her.

  She ignored the outstretched arm and hurried over to the bag of rat poison.

  Angus squatted next to the evidence, his face set in grim lines. “Who would do this? Does your mother have any enemies?”

  Bree shook her head. “Mom never had a bad word to say about anyone.”

  His lips quirked upward for a brief second. “She usually only had good to say about anyone. Even cranky Old Man Roderick.”

  Bree’s face softened. “She was the only one would could get that curmudgeon to smile.” Her jaw hardened. “She was always too nice.” To a fault. Especially toward her abusive husband. She’d let him bully her endlessly.

  Finally, Bree had had enough and stood up to him on her mother’s behalf. That had been the beginning of the end of her dreams of a future with Angus.

  “We have to show this to the sheriff.” The man of her dreams straightened. “There might be a way to lift prints off the bag.”

  She nodded toward several horses slowly moving toward them as if expecting them to give them feed or hay. “For now, I need to get those horses out of this pasture. Already, they aren’t looking so good.”

  As if to prove Bree’s statement, a sorrel mare stumbled, righted herself and stopped for a moment before continuing toward them.

  “Let them follow us to the barn,” Angus said. “Once we get them there, we can load them into a trailer and move them to Iron Horse Ranch.”

  “I’ve dumped out the water buckets and troughs,” Bree said.

  “Good,” Angus said. “That will keep them from ingesting more of the poison, as long as we k
eep them from drinking creek water. Too bad we don’t have a bucket of grain to entice them with.”

  “I have an idea,” Bree said. “You drive. I’ll ride on the back, just go slow enough for the horses to keep up.”

  Angus slung his leg over the seat and scooted forward.

  Bree slipped on behind him, removed her helmet and held it like a bucket. Then she tapped the side and clucked her tongue. “Come and get it. Supper is waiting at the ranch. Come on.” She tapped the helmet again and held it out to the two or three horses closing in on them. “Go,” she said to Angus.

  He thumbed the throttle lever, easing forward a little at a time until the horses caught on and followed the ATV, trying to catch up for a chance at a fake bucket of grain that happened to be a helmet.

  The ruse worked. Other horses in the pasture trotted over to see what all the excitement was and fell in step behind the leaders.

  Bree held onto the helmet with one arm while her other arm looped around Angus’s rock-hard abs.

  He’d been in good shape in high school, but nothing like he was now—all hard planes and thick muscles.

  Several times, Bree found herself wondering what he looked like beneath his thick jacket, blue jeans and long underwear. How would those muscles feel against her bare hands, or better, against her bare breasts?

  The ATV hit a pothole on the dirt road leading toward the house.

  Bree fumbled with the helmet and almost lost her hold on Angus.

  Angus wrapped his hand around hers, keeping her from falling off the back.

  When they arrived in the barnyard, he brought the four-wheeler to a halt and killed the engine.

  Bree leaped off and filled her lungs with air.

  The horses crowded around.

  “I’ll get a bucket of grain to lead them into the barn,” she said.

  Angus reached out and grabbed the halter of one of the geldings standing nearby. “Don’t let them eat it, just in case someone dropped arsenic in the feed as well.”

  Bree nodded. “Right.” Then she ducked into the barn, filled a bucket with enough grain to make it rattle and came back out to the pasture.

  Immediately, she was surrounded by hungry horses.

  “All we really need to do is pen them in a smaller corral that doesn’t have access to the water and call the vet.”

  “Until we know for certain what all contains toxins, I don’t think it’s safe for the animals to stay here,’ Angus said. “We can get them in a smaller corral, but we need to get them out of here until this place has had all poison removed.”

  Pressing her palms to her cheeks, Bree stared around at the horses. The ranch had at least a dozen horses. How would they move that many before sundown?

  “Do you mind if I use the phone?” he asked. “Cellphone coverage is nonexistent out here.”

  She waved her hand toward the barn. “There’s a phone in the barn in the tack room.”

  He disappeared into the barn.

  Bree checked on the horse in the small pasture she’d seen outside first. She still stood on all four hooves but swayed unsteadily.

  Tears welled in Bree’s eyes. “How could someone do this to you?” And her mother and Ray? The person responsible had to have known exactly what he was doing?

  Why? Why would someone purposely poison the people and animals of the Wolf Creek Ranch? Bree racked her brain and came up with nothing. She’d been gone too long to know what was going on other than what her mother had gossiped about during her weekly calls home.

  Her heart burned in her chest. What if she’d been too late? What if her mother had died from the poison?

  Bree couldn’t have lived with herself for staying gone for so long. She should have come home long ago.

  “The vet is on his way out. My brothers are on their way with horse trailers and trucks. I take it you have a horse trailer here?”

  She nodded. “Behind the barn,” she said, overwhelmed at how quickly Angus took charge. “I don’t think we’ll be able to move this one.” She stood beside the very sick horse and ran her hand over the animal’s neck, her heart breaking for the mare.

  “That’s why I’m having the vet meet us here to determine what needs to be done.” He ran his hand over the animal’s neck, shaking his head. “She looks bad. See here? She’s bleeding from the nose.”

  “I’m afraid for her,” Bree whispered.

  The mare swayed again. Her knees buckled, and she dropped to the ground.

  “Sweet Jesus,” Bree muttered, squatting beside the mare. “Hang in there. The vet’s on his way.” She smoothed a hand along the animal’s neck, a tear slipping from her eye.

  The mare’s breathing was fast and shallow, as if she couldn’t get enough air. Another string of blood oozed from her nose.

  “Will you be okay here?” Angus asked. “I’m going to get the horse trailer hitched and load some of the less affected horses for the move to Iron Horse.”

  Bree nodded. “I’ll be okay.” The mare beside her probably wouldn’t make it through the night, but Bree would.

  For the next ten minutes, Bree stayed with the ailing mare while Angus hooked up the trailer and started loading the healthier horses.

  The veterinarian arrived, checked the mare with Bree and shook his head. “I’ll treat her, but she might be too far gone.”

  Bree understood. Having grown up on a ranch, she knew not all the animals survived. But to die like this, broke her heart. “Please. Do what you can.”

  He treated the mare for rat poison based on Angus’s and Bree’s description of the bag they’d found by the creek. “The horses already displaying symptoms will have the hardest time recovering,” he advised. “They’ll need to be kept calm. Any injuries could cause them to bleed out internally.”

  Once he’d administered the medication that would counteract the anti-coagulant, he moved on to the horses Angus had loaded. One by one, he examined the horses and treated them so that Angus could continue loading them into the trailer.

  A truck pulled into the barnyard with a six-horse trailer in tow.

  Duncan, Colin and Sebastian McKinnon dropped down. Bree barely recognized them. All had matured into bold, brawny men with broad shoulders and thick muscles.

  Bree rubbed the mare’s neck again. “Get well.” There wasn’t much more she could do but pray. Other horses that had more of a chance of surviving needed her help. Squaring her shoulders, she approached the McKinnon men. “Thank you for coming.”

  All three men stared at her with hard eyes.

  Colin was first to speak. “We’re here to help your mother and the animals.”

  Not you.

  He didn’t say it, but the looks on all three brothers’ faces said it all.

  Shame and self-loathing burned a hole in Bree’s belly. Apparently, they still held a grudge against her for breaking their big brother’s heart thirteen years ago. She couldn’t hold that against them. She deserved their ire and more. She’d broken her promise to wait for Angus to come home after his advanced training.

  More than likely, his brothers had been there when he’d come back from training. They could have been the ones to break the news that she’d left Montana soon after he had.

  The night Bree had left home, she’d only planned to go to Eagle Rock, rent a place to live and wait for Angus’s return. But things hadn’t worked out that way.

  Bree sighed and went to work catching the rest of the horses to be loaded into the trailers.

  Once the remaining horses had been secured to the fence and the vet had treated them, the McKinnon brothers loaded the animals onto the waiting trailers.

  Bree and the vet checked on the mare several times. She remained on the ground, her breathing labored.

  The vet shook his head. “I wouldn’t hold out much hope for her.”

  With the sun covered by a layer of clouds, darkness settled over the mountains with no stars or moon to light their progress.

  Colin left with a trailer load of
horses, promising to return as soon as possible.

  Sebastian left with the second trailer.

  Bree found the wheelbarrow, gloves and a shovel and went to work cleaning up the dead chickens and cat, loading them in the wheelbarrow. Angus joined her, lifting one carcass after another.

  They couldn’t be left lying around. If another animal scavenged them, they’d be poisoned as well.

  Sheriff Barron arrived between loads of horses, the lines in his face deep, his cheeks a ruddy red from the cold wind. “I would have been here sooner, but I’ve been up in the canyon searching.”

  Duncan and Angus hurried toward him.

  The sheriff held up a hand before either man could ask. “We haven’t found your father.”

  Bree’s throat clenched as she watched the brothers exchange a glance. Their faces were stone hard.

  As tough as James McKinnon had been on his children, he’d loved them fiercely, and they’d loved him just as much. Not knowing what had happened to him had to be the worst kind of torment.

  Bree had always envied their love. She couldn’t remember her father, or his love. And her stepfather had been a colossal ass, abusive and uncaring if he hurt her.

  They hadn’t found James McKinnon. As long as they didn’t find a body, there was still hope that they’d find the patriarch alive. Bree touched Angus’s arm. She didn’t say it, but she looked up at him willing him comfort he probably didn’t want from her.

  “They’ve called off the search for the night,” the sheriff said. “They’ll be back at it in the morning,”

  “The dog didn’t find anything?” Duncan asked.

  Sheriff Barron nodded. “As a matter of fact, the dog found a glove.”

  The two brothers leaned toward him as he pulled an evidence bag out of his pocket and held it up. “Can you identify this glove as your father’s.”

  The disappointment was evident in Angus’s slumped shoulders. “It’s a work glove like the kind we get at the feed and hardware stores. Every rancher in the county has gloves like this one.”

  “The best we can do is run a DNA test on it,” the sheriff said. “But that will take time.”