First Time Train Wreck

by T. S. Joyce

  “W-what?”

  “I don’t think you deserve it. I have to train someone who weaseled into this position based on her lineage. You don’t even have the Brander name. Your mother was dumb enough to change hers when she married your father, and for what? For love? Because it sure as hell wasn’t for prestige. She had the Brander name but gave it up. And worse, she had a child and didn’t pass that name to you. Being a Brander is a privilege, one she ignored, and now here you are, little orphan Annie with your cup out, begging for a job you don’t deserve.”

  Amber leaned back like the woman had raked a claw at her. “Excuse me? I graduated college with a finance degree and finished at the top of my class.”

  “What’s your point? The other applicants did to.”

  “My point is—”

  “Enough! I’m your boss. You don’t talk back. You listen and you learn.”

  Listen to insults about her parents and learn what? She wanted to walk out. She wanted to walk out! Mom had told her what the Brander name had done for her. Absolutely nothing. Amber’s father had passed on, and her mom was unfit to raise her because her mental health was bad. Orphan Annie? Amber clenched her hands in her lap and stared at the computer screen.

  “What’s that?” she asked and pointed to a line that was highlighted in light pink. All it said was EXTRA, and the amount attached to it was $14,639.

  “Anything that says ‘extra’ we pay for out of pocket with cash. We don’t need the write-off on those. You file them under this tab.” She jammed her finger at a folder with no name.

  “What is it?”

  “None of your goddamn business. That’s what it is. You’re here to do a job, not to ask questions. I told you what to do with those charges, so do it.”

  Amber bit her lip to calm the tremble there. She didn’t want to tear up in front of this beastly woman.

  The intercom crackled, and then a voice came on. “Hey, Helena?” It was Uncle Sloane’s voice.

  Helena rushed over to the small box on the wall and pushed the call button. “Yes?”

  “One of them is here.”

  Helena glanced back at her, but Amber couldn’t read her expression before Helena gave Amber her back and murmured, “I’m training the new girl. She’s in here.”

  “Can you come up to the house?” There was an annoyed snarl in his voice.

  “I’ll be right there,” Helena told him. She slid an irritated look at Amber and told her, “Just…work your way down the contact list for the vets and farm supply stores and introduce yourself. Don’t fuck anything up while I’m gone.” And with that, Helena marched to the door, exited, and slammed it closed behind her.

  Amber jumped at the loud sound.

  What was she doing here?

  She could’ve gotten a job in Boise where her grandmother still lived and stayed in her comfort zone, kept the apartment she loved and the friends she adored. Instead, she’d taken the job Uncle Sloane had offered in an attempt to figure out where she came from. Where her mother had come from. The only person who had been nice to her was Bodey, who gave her a quick tour around the ranch yesterday, and First Time Train Wreck, who didn’t even work here.

  She didn’t belong.

  EXTRA. Amber frowned at the pink highlighted line and the ridiculous amount of money. They’d paid that in cash this week. She wondered how often Uncle Sloane did that.

  If you see something that doesn’t make sense to you? Don’t try to make it make sense, Train Wreck’s voice whispered through her mind.

  But if she were a shifter, she would be a cat, because curiosity had a strange effect on critters like her.

  Poke. She clicked the untitled folder, and her mouth fell open at the pink highlighted charges that had been added in there. They dated from last week back to seven months ago. There was at least one every week, sometimes two or three, and they were all for enormous amounts of money. But that wasn’t the insane part. At the bottom of the list, there was another folder inside the EXTRA folder named HAGAN. She swallowed hard and checked out the window. She could see Helena jogging toward the main house.

  This felt like a Pandora’s Box. Hagan. Why did that word sound so familiar?

  She clicked it and, inside, there was an itemized list highlighted in green. Each was labeled with a number, and in the money column, the numbers were all the same. Each said +$20,000.

  This was income. It wasn’t outgoing money. This was cash received in increments of twenty thousand dollars. There were twenty-eight transactions, all falling under four dates. They happened once a month from what she could tell. There was no sender information though, only the numbers and the money amounts.

  Something wasn’t right.

  A deep, dark feeling of being watched lifted the fine hairs on her arms, so she exited the folder and went back to work. Or at least she tried. She mostly just stayed busy-looking while her mind raced. Twenty-eight transactions at twenty thousand dollars each… That was—she did a quick calculation—five-hundred-sixty-thousand dollars. In cash transactions? Clearly, they didn’t want the government to see it or tax them for the income.

  What the hell was Uncle Sloane into here?

  Amber’s heart was racing against her sternum. Okay, maybe it was nothing. Maybe she’d misunderstood what it was. Maybe they were building a new barn or something, and that was just negotiations for vendors or…gah! No. Nope, nope, something was wrong. All of her instincts were blaring.

  What had Train Wreck said? Don’t get caught up in the shadows of this place.

  This felt like a giant shadow right here.

  Paranoid, she double-checked that she’d closed out of that folder and reached for the phone with trembling hands. Maybe this was a test from Helena. To see how loyal she was to the Brander name. That was probably it. This was a test. Yeah. It was a fake folder of fake numbers she’d aimed Amber at just to see her reaction. Well, Helena, if this is a trick, I’m not falling for it.

  Amber dialed the first number on the vendor call sheet and did as Helena had asked—she began introducing herself to the people the Two Thorns Ranch did business with.

  But as she talked to them, all the while she had this nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach. It was the name of the folder. Hagan.

  Hagan.

  She frowned at the bull outside.

  Hagan, Hagan, Hagan…’s Lace.

  Hagan’s Lace.

  Holy shit.

  Amber froze up as her mind raced. That’s where she’d seen that word before. Hagan’s Lace was the only cow shifter that bucked in the PBSRC. She was one of the top animals in the circuit and had finished in some big money during the finals a couple of months ago. She was mated to Dead of Winter. And they were in a herd with Two Shots Down and their manager, Cheyenne, along with Quickdraw Slow Burn and Annabelle Faulk. They did interviews together.

  Train Wreck knew them!

  Her hands were shaking so much as she punched in the personal number for a manager at a feed store in Irwin, Idaho. Hagan’s Lace was a purebred longhorn shifter with pitch-black fur and the gnarliest attitude in the bucking chutes. Her human name was Raven, but she’d chosen the name Hagan’s Lace for a reason. Amber just couldn’t remember if that question had ever been asked or answered in any of the interviews she’d watched. Amber was wracking her brain.

  She slammed the phone back into the sling and pulled her cell phone out of her back pocket. She typed Hagan into the search engine, but it was just news articles about Hagan’s Lace during the last bucking season.

  She didn’t know why, but that one word dug at her. It felt important.

  She tapped her nail on the table and stared absently at Western Center as he ate hay near the corner of his pen.

  She knew someone who would know the answer to her burning question, but if she was wrong, and this was just a test from Helena, Train Wreck would think she was crazy. And hell, she felt crazy, so she wouldn’t blame him.

  She wasn’t some trained detective, and
whatever was going on here was none of her business. It simply wasn’t. This operation had been going on for generations. This ranch produced the best bucking bulls in the world, and that’s what she needed to focus on.

  The Hagan folder with its mystery money? Well…she would have to learn to ignore it.

  Yep.

  Simple as that.

  Chapter Three

  What is a Hagan?

  Train Wreck frowned down at the text from an unknown number. Who is this? Send.

  It’s Amber. I got your number from Dead of Winter. I messaged him on his Instagram and told him I’m your girlfriend and he gave me your number. Hagan??

  Jesus. He’d asked her to do one thing—stay out of it—and what had she done? Dug up the name of the freaking bull shifters her sleazy uncle was selling to medical testing facilities. And she’d done it in half an hour. Human women sure didn’t listen to directions very well.

  Why would he give you my number? If you were my lady, you would already have it. Send.

  Take that up with your friend. Does this number make any sense? 623?

  Before he could respond, a text from Dead came through. Congrats on your new lady, man! You should probably marry her before she figures out what a douchebag you are.

  Shoot him in the eyehole. I don’t have a girl, asshole. Stop giving my number out. Send.

  Dead ignored him and texted, Ask her if she wants to come over for dinner on Friday. And ask what her favorite color is. I can make her a friendship bracelet, but I have to know right now. Raven is going to the store and she can pick up craft thread. She’s not vegan, right? We can cook steaks.

  And now Train Wreck was pretty sure he was going to give Dead a god-dang black eye the second he saw him again.

  What grown-ass man types out the words “craft thread”? Let me know when your nuts drop. Send.

  “Am I interrupting you?” Sloane Brander asked from the leather sofa across the coffee table from him.

  “Kind of.” Train Wreck shoved his phone into his back pocket. “I was enjoying a scenic tour of your ranch, and you took me away from my new friends.”

  “What friends?”

  “The other tourists.”

  “Mmmm.” Sloane narrowed his dark eyes and leaned into the couch, draped one arm over the back of it, and crossed his ankle over his knee. For a rancher, he sure dressed fancy.

  Train Wreck guessed, “I bet those nice shoes of yours have never been worn outside.”

  Sloane gave him an empty smile. “Italian leather. I don’t wear them to work in.”

  “Aaaah. You like the look of them but don’t give a shit about functionality. Not like with the bulls you breed. With them, you like the functionality, and looks come second.”

  “Why are you here?” Sloane asked.

  Train Wreck smiled. “To fuck with your head.” He leaned back and stretched a leg out, set his boot on the coffee table that was probably worth more than his life. A flake of dried mud fell off his boot, and Sloane stared at it with a slow-simmering rage in his eyes.

  “Did you ever think you would be here?” Train Wreck asked him. “In the same room with a real bull shifter? Did you ever even think you would meet one? My people aren’t very common. In fact, we are kind of rare, and here you are, you lucky bastard you, sitting across from a real bull shifter. Have you ever met one before?” Oh, he knew the answer. Sloane had pens of bull shifters in the secret barn, all drugged up on meds to keep them changed into their animals so he could load them into trucks and sell them.

  “You and your friends have been a bit of a problem for me,” Sloane said coolly. He flicked his fingers at Train Wreck. “Dillon, search him for a wire.”

  Train Wreck threw a warning look to the big cowboy approaching him. “Touch me, and you’ll die. Your boss can watch it happen. Tell me, Dillon, does the job pay enough to die for it?”

  “So you are wired,” Sloane guessed.

  “Nah. Not my style. I just don’t like being touched.” Train Wreck linked his hands behind his head and looked around the sprawling great room of Sloane’s log cabin. “I would hate to change into my bull and damage any of your furniture.”

  “Noted. Next time we have a meeting, I’ll make sure to hold it in the barn. Where you belong.” That man had the smile of a snake. Right. Nice threat. Put him in the barn with the Hagans.

  “You gonna sell me, too, Sloane?”

  Sloane clenched his teeth so hard his jaw twitched. “You’ve cost me a lot of money.”

  “How?” Train Wreck asked innocently. “I don’t even know you.”

  “By letting some of my products fall into the wrong hands.”

  Aaaah. Train Wreck had helped a batch of Hagan bulls detox from the medicine Sloane had pumped into their systems to keep them animals. And then he’d spent his own earnings to book their travel and get them back to their homes.

  “The thing I can’t figure out,” Train Wreck said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “You have Hagans out in the world that know what you did to them. What you’re still doing to them. Hagans. Do you know what they are? They’re bred to be mean. And you’re sitting here in your Italian leather loafers, in your fancy-ass house, thinking you won’t get hurt.”

  “I won’t.”

  “You will,” Train Wreck promised him. “If they don’t retaliate, I’ll do it for them.” He grinned. “Or maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll just go back home and move on with my life. Ignore the awful shit you’re doing to my people and focus on my next bucking season. Or maybe I’ll kill you.” He looked behind Sloane at Dillon, standing frozen by the dining table. “And maybe kill you, too. For fun. I’m just an animal, you see. Animals aren’t governed by those pesky human morals. Right? That’s what shifters are? Just animals? So maybe I’ll go home, or maybe I’ll hang around here for a while.” He slid his glare to Sloane. “I guess only time will tell.”

  “Tread carefully, First Time Train Wreck.” The very corners of Sloane’s lips turned up, and his voice turned to ice. “Sometimes men can be animals, too.”

  Chapter Four

  “I knew your mom,” Bodey said from behind her.

  Amber turned from where she was strapping her backpack to the front storage rack of the four-wheeler Uncle Sloane had given her to zoom around the property. “Really?”

  “Or I guess I should say I know your mom. I know she ain’t dead.” The old cowboy kicked a rock with the toe of his boot. “She’s just sick.”

  Amber smiled sadly. “Sometimes she feels dead to me, too. It’s okay.”

  “You go up and see her much?”

  “Every couple of days when I was living in Boise. I miss her.”

  “Does she recognize you?”

  Amber shrugged. “Sometimes. She has so much going on in that head of hers.”

  “Rumor says she got put in that mental hospital when your dad died. That her broken heart made her go crazy.”

  “That’s the romanticized version of it, I guess. She was showing signs of dementia before my dad passed. When he went…well, I guess it didn’t help matters.” Amber shrugged up her shoulders and looked at the surrounding snow-capped mountains. “She used to tell me about how beautiful this place was. I had this vision in my head from the image she described, but it didn’t even come close.”

  Bodey frowned at the pine woods on the edge of the clearing. “It was more beautiful when she was here. I watched her grow up. I was in charge of the bunkhouse and all them rowdy boys. She and her sisters needed to be protected from them. Oh, they were good boys, just rough around the edges, and the Brander girls were prime pickings for the local boys. Her dad was a phenomenal rancher, builder, and land-grabber, but he was pretty absent at being a dad. Your momma was special.”

  “You were friends?”

  “Sometimes I fancied she was more like a daughter to me. She came to me when she was mad or in trouble, or sometimes she would just help me with chores without saying a single word.” He cleared his throat
and shoved his hands in his pockets, looked at the ground. “Life here wasn’t easy on your momma, and it was good she left. I just missed her somethin’ fierce.”

  “Aunt Helena seems to blame my dad for…me, I guess.”

  Bodey snorted. “Helena Brander did just as she was told. She married a local boy with a big ranch and added to the acreage here, but she didn’t love one thing about him, and he never loved one thing about her. She was bitter before that marriage and bitter after. That was all her own doing, though. She could’ve cut and run, found a life outside of here like your momma did, but she decided to stay and become mean like her daddy. And we’re all more blessed for it.” And with that last little gem of sarcasm, he rolled his eyes.

  Amber giggled. “Thank you, Mr. Bodey.”

  “For what?”

  “For telling me about how it was for my mom. She was quiet about her life here. She always said her life really started when she met Dad. And now that I’m old enough to ask questions, she isn’t able to answer them anymore. I like thinking about the part of her life that was happier.”

  “That woman is tough as nails. She disobeyed every single thing she’d been groomed to do and went out and married someone her father didn’t approve of.”

  “And a black man at that,” Amber said with a grin.

  “The scandal,” Bodey whispered with a laugh. “Now, not so many would bat an eye, but back then? She quit on everything here for love and a chance at a happier life. I sure appreciated your dad and the peace he brought her. Your momma sent me letters when you were growing up. I have a dozen school pictures of you.”

  “I didn’t know!” Amber’s eyes were burning. “She did tell me stories about a cowboy she knew growing up. He taught her to ride like the wind, shoot straight as the crow flies, and to hold her chin up and look strong even when she felt weak. That was you, wasn’t it?”

  Bodey ran his hand down his grizzled gray beard and nodded. He cleared his throat thickly and said, “Sure was. Now I’m the one who writes her.”