by Diana Palmer
Late one sunny afternoon, he slipped away from the others. He’d found an old, limp rope in one of the old outbuildings near the camp and he’d spent hours every day practicing with it, as he’d seen Luke do. He was somewhat proficient, but he was bored with roping the old sawhorse that sat near the oak tree behind the building. He wondered if he could lasso a steer. Miss Jessup was occupied with the other boys, teaching them how to use her laptop computer. He preferred cattle to computers, so he coiled his rope and sneaked down the road toward a pasture full of red-coated cattle.
He didn’t realize that Luke’s cattle were only one side of the long, winding graveled road. He knew that most of Luke’s steers were Herefords, which were white and red. These cattle were red, but they might be a variation on the same breed, he decided. They sure weren’t steers, he knew that by looking at them, and they had horns. They’d be easy to rope! He slipped through the barbed-wire fence stealthily, eased into the small line of trees that outlined the green pasture and started up a small rise where a red-coated young bull was grazing.
It was the perfect time to practice the lariat throw he’d been perfecting, as Luke had showed him how to do it. He missed the first time he tried, but the animal didn’t run away. It stood chewing grass and staring at him curiously. He coiled the rope and patiently tried again. This time, he managed the throw perfectly, tossing the loop right over the short horns of the young bull. He chuckled and let out a whoop as he started reeling the bull in.
He was having the time of his life, leading the young bull around the pasture and down the hill toward the gate when he heard a loud yell, followed by a chilling report that sounded very much like a rifle being fired.
He stopped dead in his tracks, the rope in his hand, and turned to find a tall, threatening-looking man on a huge white horse sitting just a few hundred feet away on the ridge holding a rifle to his shoulder. His face wasn’t visible under the wide-brimmed hat, but the threat in his posture was immediately recognizable to a teen who’d had several brushes with gangs.
Kells dropped the rope and threw up his hands while he had time. “I was just practicing with the rope, mister,” he called. “No need to shoot me!”
The man didn’t reply. He had a cell phone in his hand now and he was punching in numbers. A minute later he spoke into it and then closed it up.
“Sit down,” a rough, deep voice called.
Kells wasn’t thrilled with the idea of sitting down in a cow pasture where rattlesnakes might be crawling, but he didn’t want to get shot. He sat down. This, he thought, was very obviously the landowner Luke had warned him about, but he hadn’t listened. He knew with a miserable certainty that he was going to wish he had.
* * *
Belinda was just beginning to clear the lunch dishes and wondering why Kells hadn’t come in to eat when her cell phone rang. She picked it up and listened, and then sat down hard.
“They didn’t have your number, so they called me,” Luke told her grimly. “If you’ll give me a minute to organize things here, I’ll pick you up and we’ll go to the police station together. I know these people better than you do.”
“What are my chances of getting Mr. Parks to drop the charges?” she asked with resignation in her voice.
“Slim to none,” he said flatly. “If Cy Parks had his way, they’d probably shoot him. I don’t think we’ll be able to talk Cy out of this, but we can try.”
“How long will it take you to get over here?” she asked, not even protesting his offer to go with her. “Twenty minutes.”
* * *
Actually, he made it in fifteen. He was dressed for work, in wide leather bat-wing chaps, old boots with caked spurs and a long-sleeved chambray shirt. He pulled his wide-brimmed hat farther over his eyes as he put Belinda into the huge double-wheeled pickup truck and drove her into town.
“Don’t get the idea that our police department is gung-ho to arrest people for no good reason,” he said as he drove. “Cy will have bulldozed them into it. By the letter of the law, Kells was trespassing, but nobody in his right mind would take a rustling charge seriously. What was he going to do with the damned bull, anyway?”
“He was practicing with the lariat, the way you taught him,” she said miserably. “I suppose he got tired of lassoing the sawhorse and wanted something real to practice on.”
“He heard me tell him to keep off Parks’s place!”
“He wouldn’t have known which side of the fence was Parks’s,” she returned. “He probably wasn’t even paying attention to the color of the animals. At any rate, yours have red-and-white coats and Parks’s have red coats, he might have thought some of yours were a solid color.”
“It’s a hell of a mess, I’ll tell you that,” he said angrily.
“Worse than you know. With his record, he may never get a chance to go home again. They’ll want to send him right back to the detention center and keep him there.”
“Damn!”
She felt furious at Cy Parks for this. Kells shouldn’t have been on his property, but he was a kid, and he didn’t think. Why did Parks have to abide by the very letter of the law?
It seemed forever before Luke pulled up in front of the neat brick building that contained the police and fire departments and the city jail.
“In here,” he indicated, holding the door open for Belinda.
The building was air-conditioned and very neat. Luke opened the door that had Police written on it, and ushered her to the counter, behind which a clerk sat.
“We’re here to see about bail for the Kells boy,” Luke said.
“Ah, yes.” The clerk took a slow breath and sorted through papers, shaking her head. “Mr. Parks was furious.” She glanced at Luke. “He’s still here, you know, giving the chief hell.”
Luke’s blue eyes turned to steel. “Is he, now? Which way?”
The clerk hesitated. “Now, Luke—”
“Tell me, Sally.”
“He’s in his office. I have to announce you.”
“I’ll announce myself,” he said shortly and forged ahead, leaving a startled Belinda to follow him.
This was a side of Luke that she hadn’t seen before. He barged right into Chief Blake’s office with only a preemptory knock, and found the chief looking uncomfortable while a tall, whipcord-lean man with venomous light green eyes and jet-black hair raged at him.
Cy Parks turned as Luke entered the office, his lean face as unwelcoming as a brushfire. “I won’t drop the charges,” he said at once, narrow-eyed and threatening. “I don’t want juvenile delinquents camped on my south pasture, and I’ll have every damned boy on the place in jail if that’s what it takes to keep them out of my cattle!”
“That sounds familiar,” Belinda said under her breath.
Luke wasn’t intimidated. He walked right up to Cy, almost on eye-level with the man, and pushed his hat back on his blond hair. “I taught Kells to use a rope,” he said angrily. “He’s crazy about roping. He’s been practicing on my cattle, but they don’t have horns.”
Cy didn’t speak. But he was listening.
“He’s an inner-city kid who got arrested for swiping a CD player. He didn’t want the appliance, he wanted to get back at his mother for letting his stepfather beat him up.”
Cy’s stiff stance relaxed just a little.
Encouraged, Luke plowed ahead. “He’s not a juvenile now, so if you press charges, they’ll lock him up for good. He’ll never get out of the justice system. He’ll become a career criminal in between terms in prison, and I’ll lose the most promising young cowhand who’s ever come my way.”
Parks’s eyes narrowed. “He likes cattle?”
“He’s obsessed with cattle,” Luke replied. “He’s drained Belinda dry and now he’s starting to pick my brain. He has a natural seat on a horse. He eats, sleeps and breathes cattle since he’s learned how to tell one breed from another.”
Parks’s jaw clenched. “I don’t like kids around me.”
Luk
e didn’t blink. He noticed that Cy always kept his left hand in his pocket, and he knew why. The man hated sympathy; it was probably why he was so mean. It kept most people at bay. “Hating kids isn’t going to bring yours back,” Luke said quietly.
The other man’s face clenched. He stiffened and, for an instant, it looked as if he might throw a punch at Luke.
“Go ahead,” Luke invited softly, evenly. “Punch me if you feel like it. I’ll give you a free shot. But let the kid go. The last thing on earth he meant to do was damage any of your stock. He loves cattle.”
Cy’s fist balled by his side and then relaxed. He moved his shoulders, as if they felt stiff, and glared at the other man. “Don’t mention my past again,” he said in a tone that chilled. He glanced at the police chief. “If I drop the charges, do you let him go?”
“With a warning,” Chief Blake agreed.
Cy hesitated. He turned toward Belinda Jessup, who was pale and quiet and obviously upset. “What was the idea behind this summer camp?” he asked curtly.
“I brought six inner-city kids to the country to see what life could be like,” she replied calmly. “Most of them have never seen a cow or a pasture or a small town. They grew up in poverty, with parents who didn’t really want them, and all they saw were people working themselves to death for minimum wage or men in luxury cars dealing drugs for big money. I thought, I hoped, that this might make a difference.” She folded her hands behind her. “It was making a major difference in Kells, until now. I’m sorry. I should have been watching him more carefully. He’s spent two days practicing with the rope. I suppose he thought he was in Luke’s pasture when he roped the bull.”
“Hell of a difference between a purebred Santa Gert and one of those damned mangy Herefords,” Cy said curtly.
“Hey,” Luke said testily, “don’t insult my Herefords!”
They glared at each other again.
“What about Kells?” Belinda interjected before things escalated too far.
“Let him go,” Cy said shortly.
Chief Blake smiled faintly. “I’m glad you decided that,” he said, rising. “I never thought roping a bull should be a capital crime.”
“You haven’t seen my new Santa Gert sire,” Cy returned.
Blake just chuckled and went to the back to bring out Kells.
Kells was chastised and miserable, and looked as if the world had ended. He grimaced when he saw Cy Parks standing there.
“I guess I’m going back to Houston, now, huh?” he asked Belinda with overly bright eyes.
“No, you’re not,” Luke said curtly, glaring at Cy. “You’re coming over to the bunkhouse at my place for the rest of your camp leave.”
Kells looked as if he’d been knocked sideways. “You’re kidding, right?”
“I’m not,” Luke assured him. “If you want to rope cattle, you have to be around them. Besides, we’ve got to talk about the future. Your future,” he added. “Let’s go.”
Kells hesitated. He walked up to Cy Parks and bit his lip while he searched for the right words. “Look, I’m sorry about what I did, okay?” he asked hesitantly. “I knew them cattle didn’t look exactly like Mr. Craig’s, but I thought he might have had some more, and that was them. I never meant no harm. I just wanted something alive to practice on. Ain’t no challenge in roping a few boards nailed together.”
Cy looked uncomfortable. He made a strange gesture with his right hand. “All right. Don’t do it again.”
“I won’t,” Kells promised. “Them bulls sure are pretty, though,” he added with a shy smile. “That breed started on the King Ranch in South Texas, didn’t it?”
Cy’s lower jaw fell a little. “Well, yes.”
“Thought so,” Kells said proudly. He smiled. “I’ll know next time how to tell a Santa Gertrudis from a Hereford.”
Cy exchanged a complicated glance with Luke. “I guess you could bring him over to see my new Santa Gertrudis bull,” he said gruffly. “Call first.”
Luke and the other occupants of the room gaped at him.
Cy glared back. “Are you all deaf?” he asked irritably. “I’m going home. I don’t have time to stand around and gossip all day, like some I could name.” He tipped his hat at Belinda in an oddly old-world gesture and stormed out the door.
Kells caught his breath as the rancher lifted his left hand out of the pocket to open the door, but Cy, fortunately, was out the door before it was audible.
“What happened to his hand?” he exclaimed.
“His Wyoming ranch burned up in a fire,” Luke said quietly. “His wife and young son were in the house at the time. He couldn’t get them out. Not for lack of trying, that’s how he got burned.”
“Oh, boy,” Kells said heavily. “No wonder he hates kids. Reminds him of the one he lost, don’t you think, Miss Jessup?”
She put an affectionate arm around Kells. “Yes, I do. Poor man. Well, let’s get back. I left the others at lunch.”
“Sorry about all the trouble,” Kells said.
Luke grinned at him. “It was no trouble.” He glanced at the chief of police and smiled. “Thanks, Chet.”
Chet Blake shrugged. “All in a day’s work. I was trying to get him to drop the charges when you walked in. But I didn’t get far, I’m sad to say. I couldn’t budge him.”
“He’s a hard-nosed fellow,” Luke agreed. “But he did the right thing in the end.”
“So he did. Maybe he’s not frozen clean through just yet,” Blake replied.
* * *
They drove back to Belinda’s camp in a companionable silence.
“I’m taking Kells with me,” he told her when he pulled up in front of the cabin, and the boys piled out onto the porch to greet Belinda. “I’ll get him settled and you can come over in a couple of days and check on him.”
“I thought you were kidding!” Kells exclaimed. “You meant it?”
“Of course I meant it,” Luke told him. “You’re a natural cowboy, Kells. I’m going to make you into a top hand. Then, when you get through school, and if you’re still of the same mind, I’ll take you on as a cowboy.”
Kells could hardly speak. He stared down at his hands in his lap and averted his head. There were bright lights in those dark eyes until he blinked them away. His voice was still choked when he said, “Thanks, Mr. Craig.”
“Luke,” he corrected. “And you’re welcome.”
“Have fun,” Belinda told Kells.
He got into the front seat beside Luke and closed the door, leaning out the open window to wave to his friends. “I’m going off to learn cowboying, you guys! See you!”
They waved back. Belinda joined them on the porch and waved the truck off with a grin.
“Is Kells going to jail?” Juanito asked.
“No, he isn’t. Mr. Parks dropped the charges,” she said with heartfelt relief. “In a day or so, we’ll drop by the Craig ranch and see how Kells is doing. But for now,” she added with a groan as she saw the disorder of the small kitchen and dining-room table, “we’re going to have a dishwashing and housecleaning lesson.”
The groans were audible even outside the cabin.
CHAPTER FOUR
Belinda kept busy with the remaining boys in her small group for the next two days, taking them swimming and fishing. They were like prisoners set free, with plenty of time to enjoy the natural world around them, and no regulations and time schedules penning them in. It was more than a vacation for them; it was a glimpse into another world. With any luck at all, it would sustain them when they had to go home, give them goals to work toward, give them hope.
Two days after Kells’s run-in with the law, they piled into the van and went over to Luke’s ranch to see how the eldest of the group was making out.
They hardly recognized him. He was wearing new boots, jeans and chaps, a long-sleeved shirt and a raunchy-looking hat. He grinned at them from the corral fence, displaying blazing white teeth.
“Hey!” he called. He jumped down an
d went to meet them. “Miss Jessup, I rode a horse all morning and Mr. Craig even let me cut out a steer and lasso it! That’s a quarter horse,” he informed the other boys knowledgeably, nodding toward the horse in the corral. “His name’s Bandy and he’s a cutting horse. He’s trained to cut cattle, so you don’t have to do much work except sit in the saddle and let him do everything. He’s one smart horse!”
“Well, he certainly thinks he is,” Luke interrupted, joining the group. “What do you think of my new hand?” he asked Belinda, indicating Kells. “Looks the part, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, he does,” Belinda said, smiling. “We need a photo of him dressed like that,” she added.
“I took one this morning,” he replied smugly. “He’ll have some interesting photos to show the folks back in Houston.”
“I’m going to work hard, Miss Jessup,” Kells said solemnly. “Harder than I ever did before. Now that I got something to look forward to, school won’t be so bad.”
“I’ll tell you a secret, Kells,” Luke told him. “School was hard for me, too. But I got through, and so will you.”
“My real name’s Ed,” Kells said quietly. “Never told nobody else.”
Luke smiled. “Is that what you want me to call you?”
Kells hesitated. “How about Eddie? I like Eddie Murphy, you know.”
“I like Eddie Murphy myself,” Luke replied with a grin. “I’ve never missed one of his movies yet.”
“Son of a gun!” Kells was impressed.
“I actually saw him once,” Belinda volunteered, “down in Cancun, Mexico, on holiday. He’s just as nice in person as he seems to be on the screen.”
“Did you talk to him?” Kells asked.
She shook her head. “I was too shy.”
Luke pushed his hat back on his head and studied her with a keen, searching look. “Shy, hmm?”
She gave him a hard look. “Yes, shy! I do get shy from time to time!”
He looked pointedly at her mouth. “Do you, now?”
She flushed. “Do you think we could see those Holstein milk cows you mentioned the other day?”