A Cowboy Worth Loving (Canton County Cowboys 1)
Page 9
She watched him ride up to the top of the ridge they’d ridden down and then come to an abrupt halt. He reached up and pulled off his hat. Running both of his hands through his thick black hair, he yelled something, but he was too far away for her to hear what it was. Suddenly she was worried, so she went over and climbed back up on Dante. Her inner thighs were screaming out in agony as she did. She clicked at him, and he took off at a gallop in the direction of Gavin and Satan. When they cleared the space between them, and she was up on the ridge looking down on what he was, she wished she had stayed put.
The dry mesa they had crossed earlier was still dotted with cattle, but now five or six of them lay dead or dying with arrows sticking out of their necks. They were the kinds of arrows that hunters used when hunting deer. She glanced over at Gavin and saw that the color had drained out of his face. He looked like he was going to be sick. She didn’t know what to say, so she didn’t say anything. When he recovered his voice, he said plenty for the both of them. It was peppered with words she never used herself but she oddly found appropriate for the situation.
When he seemed to have gotten that outburst out of his system, he looked at her and said, “Tuck Stevenson did this.” Lucy only nodded. She was as sure of it as he was. Tuck Stevenson was a mean, greedy man. He wouldn’t stop at harming animals to get what he wanted. “I have to go get the truck and get them to the slaughter house. If they lay out here too long, they’ll be completely wasted.” His words would have sounded callous toward the animals if his face hadn’t shown the agony he was feeling in his heart.
“Go. You can ride faster not waiting for me. I can make my way back.”
He looked torn and she was touched that he didn’t want to leave her. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. Go. I’ll be fine.” He nodded, and then he and Satan were off like a shot. She sat there on Dante and watched him until he was out of sight before she turned and went back to pick up the remnants of their lunch. Once she had it all back in the saddle bags, she groaned loudly and heaved her aching body back onto the horse. As much as it sickened her to see the poor dead cattle strewn across the dry land, she stopped on her way back and took photos of each and every one of them. She was sick to her stomach by the time she finished and started the long trek back by herself. She was so angry that she had half a mind to cross over onto Tuck’s land and give him a piece of her mind herself. The horse seemed to sense something wrong in the field, and he rode close to the fence line without her urging. She hoped that she remembered how to get back to the house, but after she’d ridden for a while, she realized that she didn’t have to worry; Dante seemed to know the way. She was about halfway back when she saw Gavin’s truck coming toward her with the trailer hitched to the back. He started to slow down. She saw that Brance and one of the ranch hands were with him in the truck. She waved him on. He had work to do. Awful, unnecessary work.
By the time she made it back to his cottage, she met a sheriff’s vehicle coming toward her. He stopped and she saw that it was the same deputy that had stopped Gavin from beating Tuck senseless at the festival. She wondered if he would regret that after he saw the condition of Gavin’s livestock.
“Hi there. It’s Miss Lancaster, right?” Lucy wondered how he knew her name, but then she remembered where she was.
“Yes, Lucy,” she said. She was in front of the cottage now, so she slid to her feet. She had to grab onto the saddle horn as she did. Her legs were numb.
“Are you okay, miss?”
She laughed nervously and said, “Yeah. I just haven’t ridden in a long time.”
He nodded and asked, “Do you want to have a seat on the porch?”
“I better not,” she said. “I think I’ll be better off if I walk it out a little.”
“Sure, yeah,” he said distractedly. “I’m Colt Stanfield. I’m the sheriff here in Canton County. You were with Gavin when he found the cattle?”
“Yes. We were having lunch when the dogs got excited about something. Gavin followed them to find out what was going on, and he found them.”
“Y’all didn’t hear anything before that or see anything?”
Lucy shivered as she remembered why they hadn’t noticed anything was amiss. They were both too focused on each other’s lips and the new, exciting feeling of their bodies pressed together. “No, nothing,” she admitted.
“Okay, is Gavin back out there?”
“Yeah, it’s the meadow right before you go over the little ridge to the river,” she said.
“Okay, I know it. Thanks.”
He got back into his four-wheel drive police vehicle and took off.
She stood there for a while, walking back and forth, stretching out her muscles. She was trying to talk herself into getting back up on the horse, but she just couldn’t do it. She finally took Dante by the reins and started walking back to the main house. When she got there, she saw Kayla pacing the small front yard, looking like she was about to have an anxiety attack. She looked relieved to see Lucy and went over and took Dante’s reins from her hands.
“Are you okay?”
Lucy forced a smile. “Yeah, I’m fine,” she said.
“You guys didn’t see anyone out there? No other horses or vehicles?”
“No honey, I’m sorry,” Lucy said. “We didn’t see anything.”
“Damn! Damn! Damn! Why is someone doing this to us? No, not someone. Tuck Stevenson! Why?”
Lucy put her hand on the other woman’s shoulder and said, “I don’t know. I guess because he’s a mean, greedy SOB, and he’s miserable in his own life so he wants to destroy everyone else’s. I’m really sorry, Kayla.”
Kayla nodded like she didn’t trust herself to speak. She finally pulled the saddle and bridle off of Dante and then patted him on the butt. Lucy watched in amazement as the beautiful animal took himself over and stood next to the barn. She followed Kayla over. When Kayla opened the door, Dante went inside and stopped in front of the second stall. Lucy saw the horse that had foaled a few days earlier was still in her stall. While Kayla put Dante away, Lucy went over to look at the baby. As she stood looking down into the pen at him, and he looked up at her with his big, brown eyes she suddenly felt the anger over what had happened today begin to surge up inside of her. She turned to Kayla and asked, “Do you have a vehicle I can use?”
“Just the Rhino. Where did you want to go?”
“I need to have a talk with one of your neighbors.”
“Lucy, are you sure you should do that? He’s obviously not right, or he couldn’t have done something so terrible. What if he hurts you?”
“He won’t hurt me. He likes to pick on things and people that can’t fight back. I’ve fought him once before. He knows that I’m a force to be reckoned with.”
Kayla reached up and took a set of keys off a corkboard near the door of the barn. She handed them to Lucy and asked, “Have you ever driven a Rhino?”
“I don’t even know what a Rhino is,” Lucy was embarrassed to admit.
Kayla took the keys back out of Lucy’s hand and said, “Wait here. I’ll be right back.” She went around to another building behind the barn, and a few minutes later Lucy heard the groan of an engine coming to life. Seconds later, Kayla was driving out of the building in a blue sport utility vehicle with big mud tires and a roll bar. She drove up next to Lucy and said, “Get in, I’ll drive you over there.”
Lucy hesitated. “I don’t want Gavin to get angry with me for taking you over there.”
“You’re not taking me. I’m taking you. Besides, Gavin is not the boss of me. Let’s go, I feel helpless just sitting here.”
Lucy got in and once Kayla took off, Lucy was glad that the other woman hadn’t let her take it on her own. She may have needed that roll bar. Kayla handled it like a pro, and when they reached the main road, she turned toward Tuck’s property. She drove alongside the road until they got to Tuck’s long, windy driveway. She turned onto that and followed it up. When it crested a
nd she could see the house, Lucy wasn’t surprised. It was two stories and made out of stone. The roof was made of cedar shakes, and the front porch was like Miss Hildie’s with how it wrapped around the entire place. It had to be at least five thousand square feet, and Lucy could only imagine what it must look like inside.
Kayla drove her around the circular drive in front and then shut the vehicle off. Lucy looked at her, and she could almost read the determination in the other woman’s eyes. “Kayla, it’s not a good idea for you to go in there. Let me go alone, okay?”
“He needs to believe that we know this is him and that we’re not going to just roll over and play dead.”
“I will tell him that for you. Please.” Kayla looked like she wanted to argue further, but when Lucy repeated the “please,” she sat back down in her seat.
“Fine,” she said, crossing her arms. “Will you tell him that we know it was him, he’s going to make a mistake, and he’s going to get caught?”
“I’ll tell him,” Lucy told her.
“If he messes with you, just scream your head off and I’ll be right there,” Kayla offered. Lucy tried not to laugh as she thought about how much help the tiny young woman would be against a man the size of Tuck. Instead, she just politely said, “Thank you.”
As Lucy walked up to the front door of the massive ranch house, she thought about the last time she had been face to face with Tuck. It was at his house in Houston where she’d gone to dinner with his son. She had thought she was in love with Heath at the time, and she had been a nervous wreck about meeting his father for the first time. Tuck hadn’t tried to hide his arrogance, and he had done his best to put his son down at every turn. They had finished their dinner, and Tuck decided that Heath needed to go to the store and pick up a dessert. Lucy thought it was strange, since Tuck obviously had kitchen help that had prepared the meal. Heath tried to tell his father they were fine and didn’t need any dessert, but the older man had been adamant. As soon as Heath was gone, Tuck had fixed him and Lucy a drink and was sitting way too close to her on the little sofa. Feeling uncomfortable, she’d gotten up and began to look around the room at old photos of Heath.
She was standing near the massive fireplace, looking at the photos on the mantle, when she suddenly felt the man standing right behind her. She tried to duck away from him but he caught her around the waist and held onto her while he forced a kiss on her lips. She felt like she was going to vomit. She tried to push him away, but he was too strong. While one hand held onto her, the other one began to grope its way up her leg and underneath her skirt. That was how Heath found them. Tuck tried to tell Heath she came onto him. Heath socked his father, full-on in the face, and grabbed Lucy’s arm to lead her toward the front door. They were almost there when she felt Tuck take his son down from behind. Heath fought his dad and eventually came out on top. He apologized profusely to her and even cried, telling her how badly he hated the man and how he never wanted to see him again. Six months later, they had a big fight over Heath insisting Tuck had to be invited to the wedding. A month after that, she caught him being pleasured in his office by an accused murderer. After she had it out with him over that, she found out he’d been a busy guy. Something about the clients who seemed the guiltiest turned him on the most. He turned her stomach, and Milton fired him. Lucy’s life had gotten much better after that, and she’d been content to keep her distance from all men until today. Gavin had broken through the wall that no man had been able to pierce in almost three years, and now here she was on the threshold of the man she despised even worse than Heath, and even feared a little. She raised her trembling hand and knocked. The door was pulled inward by none other than the man himself.
He looked at Lucy for a few seconds, almost like he was confused. Then his face broke out into a wide grin, and he said, “Well, hello there, Red.”
“Tuck, we need to talk,” she said. She sounded braver than she felt.
“By all means, come on in.” He looked out and saw Kayla in the Rhino. Kayla held up her phone and shot him a warning look. He grinned again and closed the door. “Come on in, pretty girl,” he said, leading her into the living room. “What can I fix you to drink?”
“I don’t want a drink. What I want to know is why you are tormenting your neighbors.”
He laughed. “Baby, I filed a legitimate lawsuit. It’s all nice and legal. No torture or torment involved.”
“What about the loss of stock? The fire? Killing their cattle with a crossbow?”
“Wow, sounds like they’re having a rough time of it. Maybe I should go over and offer my help.”
“Maybe you should, if you have a death wish.”
“You afraid your little boyfriend is going to hurt me?”
“Gavin’s not my boyfriend, he’s my client. I’m here in a professional capacity to tell you to keep your distance. I’ll be filing a restraining order against you today on their behalf. That way when you approach him again, and he beats you senseless, he can claim self-defense.”
Tuck was still smiling. He always thought he had the upper hand. “You do that, pretty girl. While you’re at it, keep telling yourself you’re just his lawyer and you’re being professional. Maybe someone will believe it.”
“Just count yourself warned, Tuck. These people are not going to cow down and allow you to take their land, and you and I both know that your son doesn’t have what it takes to beat me in court.”
“You should be my lawyer,” he said, suddenly like he really thought she might go for it. He had to be the most arrogant SOB on earth. She realized that she’d made a big mistake coming here. She’d led with her emotions, something she rarely did. She headed for the door, and Tuck suddenly stood between her and the exit. She felt a small tickle of fear in her stomach, and as she stood there waiting to see what he intended to do, her eyes caught sight of something interesting on the table in his foyer. It was a gold embossed business card with the name of the biggest fracking company in Texas on it in big, bold letters. Tuck saw her eyes land on it and suddenly he had the front door open for her. “Thanks for coming by, Red. I’ll see you in court.”
Lucy smiled at him as she left. Somehow, Tuck had found out there was something worth digging for on the Walker’s ranch. Lucy didn’t know much about oil or gas or fracking. From living in Texas her whole life she had learned enough to know that involved limestone, sandstone, shale, and she knew that if there was a pool of it underneath Salt Cedar Ranch, Gavin and Kayla were sitting on millions, maybe billions, of dollars.
Chapter Thirteen
“Fracking? Shale? How would he know what’s underneath our land?” Gavin and the other men had just gotten back from taking the dead cattle to the slaughterhouse. Kayla baked a chicken with all the trimmings while they waited for them; she had too much nervous energy to sit still. While they ate, Lucy repeated to Gavin what she’d already told Kayla about her suspicions.
“I don’t know yet. I’m going to make some phone calls to some of the companies who are already working land around here and see if I can find out.”
“What does it mean for us if he’s right?” Gavin asked. Mike stopped eating and looked up.
“I think it means you’ll be attracting a higher class of woman than your usual boss.” He grinned, but Gavin’s face stayed impassive. He glanced at Lucy. Hers was impassive as well. If earlier today was any indication, he was already attracting a higher class of woman, at least he was hoping.
“If there is shale under your land, and we’re able to win this case to make sure that it stays your land, then Mike’s right in a way. It might mean a whole lot of money if you choose to lease or sell the rights.”
“Then they come in, pull it out, and tear up the land. If that happens, it’s not a ranch any longer; it’s a petroleum factory. Just a big piece of land with a lot of holes.”
“Worth a whole hell of a lotta money,” Brance said between bites.
“I don’t care about the money,” Gavin insisted.
“If I told you that you would never be able to ride a bull again, but I’d give you a whole lot of money in exchange for it, would you be okay with that, Brance?”
“Nope.”
“I didn’t think so. This isn’t about any piece of land. This is about my family’s land. My parents and my grandparents are buried on this land for crying out loud. No way! No way in hell are they coming in here with their heavy equipment and pipe lines or mine shafts and tearing it up. No way in hell!” Gavin pushed himself back from the table and left the room. Lucy stared at Kayla. The younger woman had a far off look in her eye, and Lucy wondered what she was thinking.
Everyone at the table was quiet for a few minutes before Mike apologized. “I’m sorry, Kayla. I didn’t mean to start anything.”
Kayla drew her attention back to the table and smiled at him. “You didn’t start anything, Mike. He’ll be all right. You know how he is. He’ll go out and ride poor Satan half to death and come back with a new perspective.” Kayla stood up and started clearing the dishes. Lucy offered to help too.
When they were in the kitchen away from the men, Lucy asked, “Are you okay?”
“I’m okay. But when Gavin was in Corpus Christie, our daddy had some company out here drilling for a while. I was just a kid, so I don’t know exactly what happened with it. I remember that Daddy and Mr. Simpson, the man that owned the property over there before Tuck, had their heads together a lot that year. I know that the men were on the land for almost a year, and I want to say they were on the Simpson’s land, too. I never really thought any more about it. They were gone by the time Gavin got home, so I never even thought to mention it to him. I’m just wondering--if they did find something, would it be documented somewhere, you know, like a public record? Is that how Tuck could have found out?”