“What’s going on?” His voice is blunt, like he already knows from the tone I picked up with.
“The herd’s collapsing. At least fifteen so far. Maybe more.”
“Damn.” His breath hitches. “Is Billy back yet?”
“No. He’s still with Grant.”
“Boone with you?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m on my way.”
The call ends.
Jasper waves me down from a distance. “They’re sending someone!” he yells. “Earliest they can do is an hour and a half. The vet’s on the road already.”
Thank hell for that.
But an hour and a half… a lot can happen to a herd in that time.
I take a breath, force my brain to start organizing, because panic won’t do a damn thing for us.
“We have to separate the sick from the rest,” I tell Jasper. “Start pushing the ones that are still standing toward the south paddock. Slow, don’t spook them. If this is contagious, we can’t have the entire herd dropping.”
He nods and rushes off.
I tug off my jacket, toss it aside, and roll up my sleeves. Boone sticks to my hip as I go to help, guiding the weakened cattle upright, moving the ones still mobile.
Sweat crawls down my spine. The sun beats down hard. My breath keeps catching every time another cow stumbles.
And in the back of my mind, one thought repeats like a hammer strike:
Please don’t let this be what it looks like.
Please don’t let this take everything we’ve built.
Tex pulls up faster than I expect, his truck barreling down the dirt lane and sliding to a stop hard enough to kick dust over the fence rails.
I’m down in the south pasture with Jasper, Boone pacing circles around us, whining and pushing his shoulder against my leg like he wants me to fix everything right now. The air feels sour with panic and the sharp, wrong smell coming off the herd.
Tex jumps out even before the engine shuts off.
He’s still wearing his meeting clothes—pressed shirt tucked into dark jeans, hair combed back like he actually tried this morning. Whatever he expected when he answered the phone, it sure as hell wasn’t this.
His boots hit the dirt, and he crosses to me fast.
“Where are they?” he asks.
I point him toward the far side of the pasture, where the worst of it started. Boone takes off ahead of us, tail low, then waits with his ears pinned.
Tex sees the first cow before he even reaches her. “Shit.”
She’s down and rolling her head like she’s trying to fight something she can’t see. Her sides are huge, tight with trapped gas. Her breaths come ragged, each one harsher than the last.
Jasper hovers a few feet away, hat yanked off his head, fingers digging into the brim. “They’re all like this,” he says. “Started with two. Then more just… dropped.”
Tex crouches beside the cow, running his hand along her belly, jaw tight. “She’s bloating bad.”
