by Evie Nichole
Cal glanced over at her and offered a snort and a shake of his head. Great. So, her question had been stupid. That was nice. She’d often felt like this around him when she was a child. It was like he was so cool that she got tongue-tied and said idiotic things because she could not keep her mouth shut when she should have.
“They’re paid either way, right?” Cal pointed out. “So, it don’t matter what they’re doing as long as they’re paid for it.”
“Right.” Jesse pressed her lips together to keep herself from saying anything else that would come out sounding naive and stupid. She was eight years younger than Cal. Sometimes it felt like a million.
“There’s Brutus,” Cal finally said with obvious relief in his voice. “You see that big shape there next to the rocks?”
He was pointing down into the valley where there were a multitude of trees and rocks that created a natural wind and weather break of sorts. This was where they were heading right now. She could see that the ground was wet and soggy. Cal’s horse picked his way carefully down the slope. Her mare did the same. The horse had only been with Jesse since she’d taken possession of her parents’ ranch. It was one of the ones that Cal had raised and broken for ranch work before sending it to Jesse along with a whole string of horses he claimed were repayment for the Collins’s horses that his father had sold when Jesse was too young to stop him.
But instead of following along behind Cal’s horse in a calm manner, something at the bottom of the draw spooked Jesse’s mare. The creature skittered sideways and snorted uneasily. Her hooves made a squelching noise in the wet ground, and the churned-up earth made the air smell of dirt and debris, which was when Jesse caught a whiff of what had spooked the mare.
“Cal,” Jesse called out. She jammed her heels down and put her hand on the mare’s neck to steady her. “Cal, there’s something dead down here.”
He didn’t answer right away. He spurred his mount away from hers. The gelding snorted but obeyed. This was Cal’s regular horse. It knew better than to balk. The creature trusted Cal absolutely. So, while Jesse’s horse danced and spun in place until she finally started circling the mare on purpose to give her something else to think about, Cal rode right up to the bulky mass that was the bull they had come down here to find.
“That bastard!” Cal snarled. “That rat bastard loser! Why would he do that? Why? Why was it even necessary?”
Jesse watched wide-eyed as Cal cursed and shouted and got more upset and furious than she had ever seen him before in his life. Then he dismounted from his horse and moved toward the bull that was obviously dead on the ground. The gelding backed away as soon as Cal’s spurs were no longer holding him in place. It was something about the scent. Not just the dead smell, but also something else was spooking the horses.
“What is it?” Jesse called out to him. “What’s wrong?”
Cal squatted beside the bull and poked at his lips and gums. “Poison! I’d bet good money on it!”
“Just Brutus?” Jesse thought about all of the other livestock that had come back with that bull. “What about the others?”
“Ride around and see what you can find,” Cal ordered. “The mare should smell it out for you!”
The mare was glad to have a job. She spun on her hocks so fast that Jesse had to grab the horn or risk being flung right out of the saddle. She sent the horse sprinting up the length of the draw. They flew around Cal and his horse and the dead bull. Then they hit another set of low spots where the trees were thicker and the rocks more plentiful.
Jesse reined the mare down to a walk—or rather a prance. They couldn’t speed through here or a low-hanging branch would knock Jesse right off the horse. When the mare started tossing her head and shimmying sideways, Jesse knew.
Moments later, she spotted four little black-and-white calves lying in the grass. They appeared to have just toppled over in the night. What did that? What kind of evil substance would let an animal seem just fine and then kill it only a few hours later?
“Easy, girl,” Jesse murmured. She stroked the mare’s sweating neck. “We have to go get Cal. This stock has to be dragged out of here. It’s evidence.”
Suddenly, her parents’ accident was long ago and far away. This carnage was right here and right now. The Flying W was playing for keeps, and it was time for the Hernandez Land & Cattle Company to fight back or be pushed out altogether.
Jesse turned her horse and urged the mare to pick a careful path around the rocks as they searched for more dead stock. There had to be more. Even worse, every dead animal had to be catalogued. The vet would have to be called to do a post mortem. This was going to be one hell of a mess!
It was hard to say what alerted her to danger. The mare had been focused on the precarious track around the jagged rocks scattered across the hillside. Then it was as if the scent of both death and a predator hit all at once. The animal froze. Her chestnut hide was quivering, and Jesse instinctively grabbed the saddle horn and jammed her heels down in an effort to stick the saddle for what was coming.
There were dead steers ahead. Their hides were brown and white, stark against the green landscape. Then Jesse spotted the muted gold of the cougar’s pelt and realized she’d just interrupted someone’s breakfast.
Jesse jerked her reins and shoved her right heel into the mare’s side. The animal squealed suddenly and snorted as she spun. Unfortunately, this alerted the cougar to their presence.
The big cat turned its head. Tiny ears lay flat against the broad skull. Its snub nose wrinkled, and the mouth opened to show a full complement of teeth as its unearthly shriek sent chills of horror down Jesse’s spine. The mare was trembling and Jesse didn’t blame her.
The cat snarled again and plunged a few feet in their direction. It was a warning. The next would be a pounce, and Jesse wasn’t sticking around to see what happened afterwards. She shouted at the mare and kicked hard. The animal bolted away from the death scene as though she’d been shot from a catapult.
The athletic little horse moved low to the ground and fast. Jesse tried desperately to steer toward where she thought Cal might be, but the mare wasn’t worried about direction. Speed was all that mattered.
They plunged into a low spot, and the mare stumbled in the marshy grass at the bottom. Jesse yanked the horse’s head up to keep her on her feet. The animal squealed again and kept going. This time, Jesse was able to pull the mare’s head right, which automatically got her body heading in that direction.
There was a huge copse of trees ahead. Jesse was sure to get scraped out of the saddle. She shoved her heels down, pushed her butt into the saddle, and pulled that right rein so hard the mare’s nose practically came all the way back to Jesse’s knee. The animal spun a tight circle and kept spinning, circling crazily with such speed that Jesse felt the saddle slipping until the breast collar was all that was keeping Jesse on top of the horse.
Finally, the mare started to slow. Her sweat-slicked neck was steaming in the morning coolness. She was breathing like a freight engine, and her whole body was trembling.
“Easy,” Jesse crooned. “Easy there, girl. You’re all right. That bad kitty is way back there now.”
But that bad kitty wasn’t the only thing out here that would be looking for a handout. Dead stock brought wolves, cougars, and sometimes bears. It was time to find Cal and remember that there was safety in numbers, and in that big rifle he carried in a scabbard on his saddle.
Jesse tried to scoot her saddle back into place, but it was sitting crooked. That didn’t matter. Not right now. The mare shifted uneasily. They needed to keep moving. The horse would feel better once she was back with Cal’s gelding anyway. Safety in numbers was the herd animal’s first rule of survival.
The trees around them didn’t look familiar. Jesse tried to form a picture in her mind of where they’d run from. It was impossible to tell how far they’d come, but she tried to angle back toward where she figured Cal was still searching for more missing stock.
> “Cal!” Jesse called out as loud as she could. Not only would her voice scare away potential angry critters, but it also made her feel better to get something out that wasn’t a scream. “Calvin Hernandez, where the hell are you?”
Sudden movement to their left nearly made the mare leap out of her skin. Then both Jesse and the mare realized that it was Cal and his gelding. Cal pushed aside a big branch, and his horse stopped moving. The two of them stood there staring at the “girls” as though they had lost their damn minds. Cal rested his forearms on his saddle horn and sighed. Then he shook his head.
His expression was rather incredulous. “Did you get lost?”
“Yeah. We got lost,” Jesse drawled sarcastically. “Right after we bolted away from that cougar munching on some of your dead steers. I’ll admit I didn’t really pay much attention to where I was going. I was more concerned with staying in the saddle so I didn’t get left behind as a potential snack.”
Cal’s eyebrows shot up so high they nearly disappeared under his hat brim. “Cougar?”
“All that dead meat laying around?” Jesse reminded him. “I bet you every single one of those animals from that trailer are out here dead.”
“Shit.” Cal removed his hat and shoved his hair back away from his face. “I have to go back and call the vet.”
“Don’t you have a phone on you?” Jesse couldn’t believe he ran around out here without one.
He snorted. “How many bars do you have right now?”
“Right. Good point.” She pulled out her phone and glanced at the display. “I’ve got enough to send a text. Can’t you text your foreman to call the vet? They could be halfway out here before we can even get back to the ranch to make a phone call.” She didn’t know what was driving this urgency, but it was definitely there. “We need to hurry. We need a blood test. I have a bad feeling that what we’re dealing with is going to start dissipating sooner rather than later.”
He pressed his lips into a tight line. “You thinking nitrate poisoning like I am?”
“Can’t think of anything else.” She pointed in the direction he’d just come from. “So, let’s go find some service and get someone out here to do a blood test before it’s too late.”
Cal nodded to her. She started to ride right past him, but he reached out and grabbed her reins. The mare stopped and sidled closer to his gelding. Jesse frowned. What was he doing? They were wasting time!
Then he pulled off one glove and reached out to lay the backs of his cool fingers against her cheek. She felt like her breathing just stopped. He was staring right into her eyes. The intensity of that blue gaze was so arresting that she almost could not meet it. She wanted to look away, but that wasn’t the kind of person she wanted to be. Jesse Collins wasn’t a coward. So, she stared right back into his face and waited to see what would happen next.
His full lips curved up into a smile. Nobody had a smile like Cal’s. Nobody. He didn’t use it very often, and that’s sometimes what gave it a bigger punch. She felt the warmth of that expression like the sun on a cloudy day. He touched her lower lip. She shivered. Warmth flooded her body, and a tingle whipped through her limbs that had nothing to do with their situation and everything to do with this man sitting so close.
She could have kissed him. He could have kissed her. The thought was instant and devastating. She didn’t know what to do. The urge to lean in and feel how soft his lips really were was overwhelming. She had never wanted anything so badly before in her life. But was it wrong? Was it right? How could she ever trust herself with this man when everything in their lives was so determined to drive a wedge between them?
Chapter Eight
Calvin Hernandez had never been so viscerally aware of someone before in his life. The ranch was now crawling with officials. A full contingent of livestock inspectors was on-site taking blood samples from the dead stock. The vet was there with his three assistants and had eventually called in a colleague to look at the results in order to make a final decision on the poisoning. There were official vehicles everywhere, and every one of Cal’s ranch hands had mounted up to begin the laborious and depressing task of dragging livestock out of the woods to be examined.
Jesse was still there helping out. She had continued to ride Mora even though the high-strung mare had nearly dumped Jesse half a dozen times during the process of dragging dead livestock. The mare was young. Cal had broken her himself, but she wasn’t necessarily a good fit for ranch work. Jesse had been determined to prove him wrong, of course. And Jesse was patient and had a gentle hand with a horse. It was one of the things that Cal had admired about the woman from the time she was a young girl.
“I think we’ve got everyone but Brutus out of there,” Jesse said as she rode up and reined Mora to a halt right beside Cal. “You going to mount up and give us a hand with that bull?”
Cal slapped his cowboy hat against his thigh. He couldn’t speak. When it came to the death of Brutus, he was too depressed to even consider what had happened to the old bull. Cal could only shake his head and rail bitterly against what was, apparently, a casualty of his family’s war with the Flying W.
“Cal?” Jesse’s voice was soft. She sat quiet in her saddle and sighed. “I’m sorry about your bull. I know Brutus was one of your favorites. I get that. But we need to get his body out of there before it becomes cougar bait.”
“I know.” Cal couldn’t help it. His words came out grumpy. That was just how he was feeling right now. “I’m just sick and tired of this crap! I’m tired of Captain Paul Weatherby getting away with murder just because he’s a cop!”
Deputy Ortiz and Deputy Perkins were standing nearby with their heads together. Cal wondered what they were talking about. He’d called them back out to the ranch when it had become apparent that the stock had been poisoned. But there was no telling how they would classify this mess. And it was most certainly a mess.
With a deep sigh of frustration, Cal mounted his horse and followed Jesse back into the trees. There were already two cowboys dallying ropes around Brutus’s horns. Cal watched Jesse drop a loop in her rope. Her face was set in concentration. He knew that roping was not her strong suit, but she’d been practicing and trying like hell to be proficient enough to be useful on a ranch for years now.
When that loop settled neatly around Brutus hind legs, Cal felt an immediate sense of pride in her work. She played it down, but he could see the big smile she was trying to hide.
“You going to help?” Jesse teased. “Or are you just going to sit there being surprised that I can do this stuff?”
“I’m not surprised.” Cal dropped a rope over Brutus’s front feet. “You’re the most competent woman I know.”
“Oh, woman!” Jesse shot a glance at the other two cowboys. They were already laughing and pointing at Cal. “Did you hear that, guys? Cal says I’m pretty good for a girl!”
The four of them dallied the ropes tight around their saddle horns and angled their horses to pull. It was tough to get the bull’s enormous bulk moving. But once they did, it was possible to head back toward the spot where the vet had set up shop.
“Of course, Cal doesn’t know many girls,” Jesse told the cowboys. “Or maybe he just said that because he didn’t want the two of you to quit and leave him here to haul this bull carcass around on his own.”
They were all three laughing and joking together now. Cal didn’t join in. He felt saddened by the task they were doing, but more than that, he was disgusted by everything that was going on right here on the Hernandez ranch right now. And when they finally got Brutus to the veterinarian and his assistant, Cal decided he’d had enough.
Dropping his rope, he spurred his gelding away from all the drama and headed for the top of the hill. Once there, he finally felt as though he could draw a deep breath. He’d been sitting up there letting his horse lip the grass when he heard hoofbeats behind him.
“The vet agrees that it was nitrate poisoning,” Jesse said quietly as she halted Mora rig
ht next to his gelding. “They’ve got samples of every animal we could find. Without a list or some kind of inventory, it’s impossible to know if there are more out there.”
“Fortunately, it isn’t catching,” Cal said bitterly. He turned to look at Jesse. Her blue eyes were troubled. He had to stop and appreciate the fact that she realized what was at stake here. “The brands had been changed. Did you see that?”
“I did.” She stared off into the distance. There were still low-hanging clouds over the mountains. Soon it would start raining again. The sun had already been covered in clouds, and the temperature was dropping again. “That means it’s a good thing they took Brutus. Surely they didn’t actually mean to provide you with an animal that would absolutely corroborate your story that these were your stock to begin with.”
“The other mistake is in poisoning them.” Cal pulled a toothpick from his T-shirt breast pocket and put it between his lips. He needed something to do to keep his mind from going off the deep end. “You can hide an animal once it’s been slaughtered. When you flip it over, you can see what brand was on there first.”
“Maybe it’s time to start freeze branding,” Jesse mused. “It’s more expensive, but if this is what’s going to happen with standard old-fashioned branding, then why bother?”
“Good point,” Cal murmured. “I suppose we could look into it. There’s no harm in looking into it.”
“What’s really bugging you?” She sighed and reached over to flick the brim of his hat.
He reared back to keep her from knocking his hat right off his head. It was a bit of an obnoxious move, but it was also a reminder of when they’d been younger. Cal knew she was trying to get a smile out of him. He appreciated the gesture even if it was a bit of a miss.
“This is all wrong,” Cal growled. He looked over at her and then swept his hand out to encompass the whole ranch. “That ass has us running scared on our own ranches. He’s murdering our stock, stealing whatever he wants, and basically making us look like idiots.”