He was at the barbecue as a friend to the Sinclair family, especially Thomas. They’d reconnected when he moved back five months ago. They had grown up as best friends and only lost touch with each other when he moved to Amarillo, and then to Dallas as a highway patrol officer and later a Texas Ranger. He’d welcomed the change. He couldn’t stay and watch Thomas’s sister, Rebecca, marry another man.
Three waiters came out of the house with Hattie right behind them directing them in their duties. He approached the housekeeper as the young men left to take their places.
“My lands, Brody Calhoun, you have grown even taller than the last time I saw you. What, six feet four or five inches?” Hattie greeted him with a hug, his large frame dwarfing her petite one.
“Still six three.”
“Are ya sure? What was it ten years ago?” She cocked her head to the side. “And why has it been ten years? One day you’re around a lot, then all of a sudden you’re gone.”
“I became a highway patrol officer. They sent me to Amarillo.”
“Why did you leave the San Antonio Police Department?”
“Because I wanted to be a Texas Ranger.” Because I was too late. Rebecca loved another.
“How’s your dad? Did he tell you I visited him a couple of times in the hospital?”
“Yes. We kept missing each other, but I’m glad you did. It brightened his day.”
“I bet he gave you and his doctors a tough time about staying in the hospital. I imagine you’ve had your hands full corralling your dad, so I’ll forgive you for not coming here until today.”
Brody reflected back to that week, tension clamping around his spine. “You imagined right. He wasn’t too happy being trapped in the hospital being a human pin cushion, as he put it.”
Hattie’s chuckle reminded Brody of the good times he’d spent at the Circle S Ranch. “That doesn’t surprise me at all. He reminds me of my husband. He insisted on coming home to die. He wasn’t going to stay in the hospital and have the last thing he saw be that room with its beige walls and every machine in the world hooked up to him. His words. I still miss him after five years.”
“I didn’t even know about him dying until a week after the fact.”
“I got your letter, and it meant a lot to me. I had a small memorial service before I scattered his ashes over the land he loved so much.”
“The Circle S Ranch?”
“Yep. He was foreman here for thirty years. He’s the reason I’m here taking care of Mr. Sinclair’s two adorable children. It doesn’t look like my daughter is going to get married anytime soon and give me grandchildren.”
Tory stepped out onto the front porch to survey the yard, from the lights strung up, to the tables set with red-and-white checkered tablecloths, to the grills set off to the side behind the buffet area.
Hattie leaned close to Brody and whispered, “She wanted a fancy party once she found out about the governor. Thomas had to put his foot down.”
“Yeah, I can imagine. He’s the least pretentious person I know. Besides, Tory must not know Foster well. He’s a lot like Thomas.” Brody pivoted toward Thomas’s wife, who was walking across the manicured lawn.
She stopped beside Hattie. “Your daughter said the brisket is ready to come out of the oven.”
“I’d better go and put the finishing touches to the food.” Hattie clasped Brody’s arm. “Don’t be a stranger now that you live in San Antonio and your dad is getting better. I don’t want it to be another ten years before you come back to the ranch.”
As Hattie hurried into the house, Brody said, “I’d forgotten how much I love this ranch. I spent many days exploring this place with Thomas. Where is he?”
The corners of Tory’s mouth twisted into a frown. “Out checking fences. I don’t know what gets into that man’s head—he knows he needs to be here when the guests start to arrive.” She looked down the long drive and moaned. “Two cars full of guests who are here for his birthday. What do I tell them?”
“The truth. He had a situation he needed to take care of on the ranch, which I’m sure is what has kept him away. A lot of the guests are ranchers and will certainly understand. If he’s not back in twenty minutes, I’ll go out looking for him.”
Tory’s forehead grooved deeper. “You don’t think he really ran into a problem?”
“Knowing Thomas, he’s forgotten the time. I can gently remind him he has guests.”
“Rebecca already went out after him.” Tory started toward the two cars now coming to a stop. “Call her on her cell. You don’t want to cover the same ground that she has.”
“What’s her number?” Glad Tory’s back was to him, he doubted he was doing a very good job covering his reaction to hearing Rebecca’s name.
Tory rattled off the number, then greeted the first set of guests while Thomas’s daughters raced out of the house, dressed in their Sunday best. He wondered how long Aubrey would stay clean in her pretty white dress. According to Thomas, his youngest loved to don her fancy clothes even when going out to play in the yard. His gaze swung to Kim with her matching outfit, but her face reflected her discomfort. She was Thomas’s tomboy and probably only wore a dress when Tory insisted.
Kim threw him a glance as she crossed to her stepmother. He smiled at her, only having seen her a handful of times in the past five months when Thomas brought her into town with him on the weekend. He’d only been around Aubrey once, when the girls went with their father to Sea World and he had tagged along. Aubrey was the very image of Thomas—and Rebecca. A picture of Rebecca materialized in his mind: medium height with just the right curves, auburn hair, thick and wavy, framing a beautiful face dominated by blue eyes that were the color of the sky on a clear sunny day.
As another SUV pulled up, the picture of Rebecca vanished, and he quickly oriented himself to the task at hand. He waved at two fellow Texas Rangers, then strode toward the barn while digging out his cell to call Rebecca. A thin film of sweat coated his forehead and upper lip. Listening to the phone ring, he swiped his hand across his brow.
Get over it, Calhoun. You knew she was going to be here.
Rebecca neared Thomas’s stallion, who was coming up a small incline, his pace slowing. Rocket’s ears twitched back and forth, independent of each other and his eyes were wide, their whites showing. His nostrils flared.
Something’s wrong. What spooked him?
She slowed Angel Fire so as not to spook Rocket further and kept shortening the distance between them. When her cellphone rang, she gasped and pulled back on the reins with one hand while fumbling for her phone with the other.
Rocket came over the rise as she answered, “Rebecca.”
“This is Brody Calhoun. I’m at the house and told Tory I would help you look for Thomas.”
That was when she saw that Rocket was dragging a rope. Her gaze latched onto what the stallion towed. A scream erupted from deep in her throat, and the cellphone slipped from her fingers.
2
The sound coming from his cellphone curdled Brody’s blood. He ran flat out toward the stables as he shouted into the phone, “Rebecca. Rebecca, what’s wrong?”
Nothing but sobs came through the connection. Suddenly the line went dead. Still holding the phone, he quickly saddled the nearest horse and hoisted himself up onto it, then called Rebecca again. It went to voicemail.
Where are you? The ranch covered thousands of acres.
Scanning the yard, he spied Jake standing by a corral behind the stables and spurred his gelding toward the foreman, whom he’d met a couple of times in town with Thomas.
“Do you know where Rebecca went?”
“East toward the front of the property, by the road. At least I think so. I told her Thomas went that way.”
“There’s something wrong. I called her, and all I got was a scream and sobs.”
“Rebecca?”
Brody nodded. “I’m headed that way.”
“So am I. I’ll be right behind you with s
ome help. Most of the vehicles are out, but we’ve still got one four-wheeler here.”
“Don’t say anything to Tory or Hattie until I know what’s happened. Bring a few men to help.”
Jake ran toward the stables while Brody brought his horse around and headed toward the eastern part of the Sinclair ranch. Still a lot of ground to cover even with it narrowed down.
Setting his gelding into a gallop, Brody was vigilant for any sign of trouble, anything out of the ordinary.
Thomas’s horse slowed at Rebecca’s urging. She hopped to the ground and made her way toward Rocket. “Easy, boy.” The stallion snorted and moved a few steps to the side. “Whoa.” Rebecca snatched up the dangling reins.
Rocket’s extra couple of steps brought what the stallion had been dragging over the incline. Her hand tightened about the reins. She glimpsed the bloody body at the end of the taut rope tied to the stallion’s saddle.
“No!” Sobs tore from Rebecca’s throat. It can’t be Thomas. Frozen, she maintained her grip on the leather strap to keep the horse from taking off again.
He could be alive.
That thought sent her into action. Trying to untie the taut line tethered to her brother’s saddle while holding Rocket still, she couldn’t loosen the knot. She didn’t have anything to cut the rope, and there was no way she would release the horse with Thom—a man tied to him. When she started to back Rocket toward the body on the ground, hoping the stallion in its agitated state wouldn’t step on the man, an idea popped into her mind.
“Easy, Rocket,” she murmured over and over in a calm voice that didn’t reflect how she really felt.
With the reins in one hand she unfastened the girth. Once the saddle slipped to the ground, she released the stallion. Now free, he shot forward while she raced toward the person caught up in the rope—hauled, no telling how far, by Rocket.
Rebecca knelt next to the body. Although his face was covered in blood and dirt, she instantly knew it was her brother by the brown curls she’d teased him about as a child. How did this happen?
She reached out with a shaky hand to feel for a pulse. Pressing her fingers against his neck, she looked into his face for any sign of life. A faint pulse beat beneath her touch. A flicker of relief fluttered through her.
He’s alive.
She had to get help. Now. She dug into her pocket for her cell. Nothing.
“Where is it?” She had it in her hand then . . .
Bolting to her feet, she strode back toward Angel Fire, scanning the ground as she went. There in the dust lay her cell, smashed as if her horse had stepped on it.
Useless.
She hurried back to Thomas, checked again for a pulse and once more found a faint one. Lord, help. I don’t want to leave him. What do I do?
She surveyed her brother’s injuries to determine if she could do anything for him before she rode back for help. The leg that was caught in the rope was bent at an angle. Broken. His jeans were intact but his shirt was shredded, hanging off him in strips. Scrapes, cuts, and blood everywhere. He must have been dragged a good distance.
“What happened, Tommy?” She smoothed his hair away from his face, revealing bruises beginning to form and more scrapes and cuts from the brush and rocks on the ground.
It didn’t matter at that moment. She had to get help. She rose and started for Angel Fire. In the distance, she glimpsed a rider coming toward her. Jumping up and down, she waved her arms to make sure the person saw her.
When he came closer, she saw that it was Brody Calhoun. She’d heard he was back in town and that he was coming to the party. Thank goodness he had called her on her cell before she had dropped it. The sight of him comforted her—help would be here shortly. She went back to Thomas, wishing her expertise were in medicine, not law.
For the third time, she made sure Thomas was still alive and then prayed her brother would be all right with only a broken leg and a few bruises and cuts.
Brody halted his horse only feet from Thomas and Rebecca.
“What happened?” he asked as he leapt from his saddle.
“I don’t know. He’s unconscious, but alive. My cell got stepped on and doesn’t work. Call for help.” As she spoke, Brody took his phone out and began punching in a number.
In the background, over the sound of Brody talking, Rebecca heard a four-wheeler coming toward them. She wasn’t alone to deal with this. You never are, weaved through her thoughts, and she felt the hand of the Lord on her shoulder.
Brody finished his call. “Help is on the way, and I notified them back at the house.”
Rebecca whispered a prayer as she examined Thomas’s skull to assess the extent of his injuries. Several deep gashes on each side worried her more than the broken leg. His head must have bounced about, hitting the rocks that littered the ground in this part of the ranch. She was afraid to lift him to check his back, where the worst damage would be.
Hadn’t she read somewhere not to move a person with a possible spine or neck injury? What else?
Keep him warm. She hurried to the saddle she’d removed from Rocket and grabbed the blanket that was underneath it, then returned to Thomas. She knelt next to him and covered him. She wanted to clean his wounds but had nothing to do that with. A couple of them still bled.
“I need something to stop the bleeding,” she said over her shoulder to Brody.
While Jake drove up with Gus, a cowhand, Brody shrugged out of his shirt and gave it to Rebecca. Pressing the cotton material into Thomas’s worst injuries, she continued her prayers for help to be here quickly because she didn’t know what she was doing. Her hands shook as she went from one deep gash to another.
Having done what little she could, she sat back on her heels. Her heart continued to hammer so rapidly against her ribcage that it was difficult to draw in a decent breath. Jake crossed to Brody and said something she couldn’t hear. If something was going on, she needed to know.
She pushed up to her feet. Too fast. She wobbled from lack of food; toast in the morning was the only thing she’d had that day. Before she realized it, Brody had wrapped his arm around her and steadied her.
“Okay?” he asked, leaning closer to her ear.
She moved away. “I should have eaten lunch but with the trial . . .”
“Yeah, I know you. You throw yourself into your job and forget everything else, even eating.” He dug into his pocket and handed her a mint. “This will help your blood sugar. A helicopter is on its way to take Tommy to Mercy Memorial, so it shouldn’t be long.”
Jake stooped next to Thomas and assessed him. “We need to splint his leg. Gus, see if you can find a branch I can use.”
While Gus scoured the ground for something to use, Jake removed his belt. Brody did the same with his, and assisted Jake as he used the straight tree limb Gus brought him to stabilize Thomas’s broken leg.
Jake rose. “There isn’t much else we can do until help arrives.”
She wished she could do something more. She fought the helpless feeling inching over her. “This shouldn’t have happened. Thomas is always careful.” Her gaze fastened onto her brother lying on the ground with a blanket over him, his blood leaving a trail to follow.
Still kneeling next to Thomas, Brody peered up at her. “After we get him to the hospital, we’ll talk about this. Riding accidents happen even when we’re careful. Remember the time he broke his arm being bucked from his horse?”
“Because he was riding a stallion he shouldn’t have been riding. Dad didn’t let him forget that.”
Brody checked Thomas’s pulse, then stood. “Still not strong.”
She lifted her gaze to Brody’s face, shadowed by his cowboy hat. “He’s going to be okay, isn’t he?”
“I’m not going to lie to you. It doesn’t look good.”
Her throat closed, trapping any response she wanted to say. Not even the heat of the day still lingering in the air could warm her chilled body. Her brother needed her. She squatted beside him again and to
ok his hand, putting her two fingers over the pulse in his wrist. As long as she felt his life force beneath her touch, she would be all right.
Vaguely she heard Brody and Jake whispering behind her again. She tossed a look over her shoulder. “What are y’all saying?”
“Just trying to figure out what happened, Miss Rebecca.” Jake removed his hat and struck it against his jean-clad leg. Dust flew off the black felt. Then he plopped it back on his head and headed toward Angel Fire while Gus took hold of the reins of the gelding Brody had ridden.
“After Thomas is picked up, Jake and Gus are going to track Rocket’s trail to see where it happened. They’re going to take our horses, and we’ll use the four-wheeler.”
“You think there’s a cow stuck somewhere, or one trying to have a calf?”
“Thomas tied the rope around his saddle horn for a reason. Maybe he was trying to get a calf or cow out of a mess. Either way, while it’s still light I’d like to know where this happened and possibly why.”
“Can’t it wait? The trail will be here tomorrow morning, or Thomas will wake up and tell us.” She spoke with more confidence than she felt. She wasn’t going to say out loud that Thomas might not make it. “Jake probably should get back to help Hattie. I imagine by now it’s chaos at the ranch house.”
“Probably so. Tory didn’t take the news well at all. I told her we would be back there as soon as possible.” Brody walked up to Rebecca and crouched beside her. “There’s a good chance it’s going to rain after midnight. I wouldn’t want the hoof prints washed away without at least checking them now.”
He wasn’t saying that Thomas might not ever tell them what had happened. But the implication was evident in his strained voice and evasive look. “What if he can never tell us?” She asked the question he was probably thinking too.
Scorned Justice: The Men of Texas Rangers Series #3 (Men of the Texas Rangers) Page 2