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“True, but Ty figures four weeks is long enough. We’ll see if he manages to convince the doctor of that.”
Stumpy grinned. “He’s probably hopin’ he’ll persuade Doc to split the difference and let him take it off in another week.”
“Probably.”
“That reminds me.” Stumpy paused in his securing of the post. “I ran into Amy Trumbo at noon. She tells me that O’Rourke’s bein’ released from the hospital today. Is that true?”
“Yeah, Cat went to get him. She should have him home before dark.”
Chase remembered much too vividly that moment when he realized one of the kidnappers had shot his son. He saw again, in his mind, the brilliant red of all that blood, the desperate struggle to stop the bleeding and the gut-tearing mixture of rage and fear he’d felt.
But his son Ty hadn’t been the only one to suffer at the hands of the kidnapping duo; Culley O’Rourke, his late wife’s brother, had also been shot—in his case, multiple times.
Stumpy wagged his head in amazement. “I still don’t know how in hell O’Rourke survived.”
“He’s got more lives than a barn cat.” Chase couldn’t honestly say whether he was happy about it or not. There had never been any love lost between the two men. At the same time, he knew that O’Rourke lived only for Cat, Chase’s daughter and O’Rourke’s niece. Maybe it was Cat’s uncanny resemblance to Maggie. And maybe it was just plain love. Whatever the case, O’Rourke was devoted to her. And like it or not, Chase had O’Rourke to thank for his part in getting young Quint back, unharmed.
“I guess O’Rourke will be stayin’ at the Circle Six with Cat and Logan.” Stumpy scooped dirt around the post with his boot and tamped it down.
“That’s Cat’s plan anyway. But you know what a lone wolf O’Rourke is,” Chase said. “My guess is that it’ll only be a matter of days before he’s back on the Shamrock.”
“Is he strong enough to look after himself?”
“Probably not, but that means Cat will burn up the road, running between Circle Six and Shamrock, making sure he’s all right and has plenty of food on hand.” Noting that Stumpy had the job well in hand, Chase took his leave. “I’d better get moving before Ty and Jessy wonder what happened to me.”
As he took a step away, Stumpy called him back, “Say, I’ve been meanin’ to tell you, Chase—do you remember that young bull Ty sold to Parker from Wyoming last year? The one he wanted for his kid’s 4-H project.”
“What about it?”
“He walked away with the grand championship at the Denver stock show.”
“Where’d you hear that?” Chase frowned.
“From Ballard. He hit the southern show circuit this past winter, hirin’ out to ride in cuttin’ horse competitions and doin’ some jackpot ropin’ on the side. That’s how he happened to be in Denver. He saw a good-lookin’ bull with the Triple C tag and started askin’ questions.”
Stumpy’s grin widened. “It was grand champion, imagine that. And that bull was one of our culls—a good’n, but not the quality of the ones we kept.” With a wave of his hand, he added, “You need to tell Ty about it. As proud as he is of the herd of registered stock we’ve put together, he’ll get a kick out of it.”
“I’ll tell him,” Chase promised.
The high drone of a jet engine whined through the air, invading the stillness of wind and grass. Automatically Chase lifted his head and scanned the tall sky. Stumpy did the same as Chase and caught the metallic flash of sunlight on a wing.
“Looks like Dyson’s private jet.” Stumpy almost spat the name. “Coal tonnage must be down, and he’s comin’ to crack some whips. You notice he’s makin’ his approach over pristine range and not the carnage of his strip mines.”
“I noticed.” But Chase carefully didn’t comment further.
“That’s one family I’m glad we’ve seen the back of.”
Chase couldn’t have agreed more, but he didn’t say so. Ty’s marriage to Dyson’s daughter Tara had been relatively brief. Looking back, Chase knew he had never truly approved of that spoiled beauty becoming Ty’s wife, although Maggie had. To him, there had always been a cunning quality to Tara’s intelligence, a quickness to manipulate and scheme to get what she wanted. Thankfully Tara was part of the past, another subject to be put aside, but not forgotten.
Yet any thought of Tara and that troubled time always aroused a sore point. Chase had yet to obtain title to those ten thousand acres of government land within the Triple C boundaries. The memory of that hardened the set of his jaw, a visible expression of his deepening resolve.
Without another word to Stumpy, Chase walked back to the ranch pickup, climbed in, and took off in the direction of The Homestead.
A cluster of old buildings crowded close to the shoulder of the two-lane highway that raced past them. A roadside sign to the south of them, its face pockmarked with bullet holes, identified the unincorporated town of Blue Moon. Long gone was the grain elevator that had once punctuated the horizon. It had been bulldozed to the ground years ago—as had the dilapidated structures that once occupied the back streets. In their place were a few modern brick buildings, a scattering of new houses, and a trailer court to house the employees of Dy-Corp’s nearby strip-mining operation.
These were the changes Chase always noticed when he drove into Blue Moon, like the fresh coat of paint on the exterior of Sally’s place. The combination restaurant and bar had long been the sole watering hole for the surrounding area. In his youth, the site had been the home of a roadhouse complete with whiskey, women, and gambling. Prior to that, it had been a general store and saloon, established by the town’s first settler, Fat Frank Fitzsimmons.
Fat Frank was also the man who nailed up the first sign, dubbing the location Blue Moon. Local legend had it that the name was a gift from a passing cowboy who predicted failure for Fat Frank’s fledgling establishment, declaring that people came this way only once in a Blue Moon.
