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The old cowboy chuckled. “I wouldn’t notice unless it happened right in front of me. I mind my own business. That’s how I’ve managed to live this long.”
Brock finished his breakfast and walked out onto the porch. Usually the sweeping view gave him satisfaction. This morning all he felt was frustrated rage. How could he fight back against an enemy that refused to show their hand?
Unless that hand was a kiss.
Was it really Tess who was working against him? Was she playing on his lust, luring him into her web like a female spider?
She had plenty of reasons to resent him—including his past treatment of her father, the partnership he’d forced her to accept, and what she would see as his threat to take in Shane and his family. So far, no other theory made sense. But he needed evidence, and he had yet to find any proof that she was involved in a scheme to ruin him.
Cursing under his breath, he paced the length of the porch. What he needed was a break to clear his head. Maybe he could take the Cessna and fly up to his lodge for a few days of trout fishing. Standing in a swirling creek with a fly rod had always calmed his nerves. But this time he knew it wouldn’t help. There could be no escaping the worry that gnawed at his gut.
Stepping off the porch, he strode around the house to the stable. Jim was cleaning out the stalls, forking the soiled straw into a wheelbarrow. He glanced up as Brock walked in. “Anything I can do for you, sir?”
Brock hesitated, then shook his head. “I’ll be taking the sorrel out. But go on with your work. I’ll saddle him myself.”
He led the rangy gelding out of its stall and cross-tied it while he buckled on the saddle and bridle. As was his practice, he slid a loaded rifle into the scabbard. Mounting, he rode across the yard and out into the pastures.
The morning was cool and clear, the grass damp with dew. The air rang with bird calls. Brock opened the horse up and let him run at a full gallop along the fence line and up to the east pasture, where the beef cattle grazed. These were steers, bought as calves and put out to be fattened until they reached market weight. Much as Brock loved his bulls, it was these beeves that kept the ranch solvent. Prime, grass-fed Angus beef from the Tolman Ranch always commanded top prices.
He paused at the top of a knoll, gazing out over the pasture and the desert that lay beyond the fence. Sunlight glistened on dew-beaded clumps of cholla. A jackrabbit, its mulish ears twitching, regarded him with curious eyes before it bounded away. As Brock inhaled the fresh morning air, he felt some of the tension leaving his body. This new threat would not crush him, he vowed. He was ready to go back and fight with all the resources at his command.
He was turning the horse to head back to the house when he happened to look up. Two thin, black Vs, etched like calligraphy against the sky, circled overhead.
Vultures.
Now there were three of them, then more, spiraling downward toward something beyond the next hill. Brock felt a cold tightening in the pit of his stomach. He urged the horse to a lope, flying over the uneven ground.
As he crested the top of the hill, he saw them—two steers, hopelessly tangled in the barbed wire of a downed fence. The hideous black birds were already flocking around them.
As he rode close, Brock could see that one animal was dead. The other one was beyond saving. Drawing the rifle, he fired a shot to end its suffering. At the sound, the vultures rose in a black cloud, circled, and settled at a short distance, waiting.
How long had the two steers been here? Twenty-four hours at least, Brock calculated. Long enough for them to die in misery. Just as vital was another question—how long had the wires been down?
Anger boiled in him as he turned away and studied the fence. The metal posts lay at a slant, leaving the loose wire, with its cruel barbs, high enough to trap a steer’s legs. The animal’s struggle would have made the tangle worse. The stakes had been planted deep in solid ground. A steer bumping against the fence wouldn’t have budged them. To tilt them that far, they would have to be pulled at an upward angle—something that could best be done with a rope and a horse.
Brock scanned the ground but found nothing definitive. Steers, mounted cowboys, and wildlife had passed along this fence, leaving prints that vanished with time and wind. But he didn’t need tracks to tell him that what he’d found was no accident. Someone was sending him a message.
Tess couldn’t have done this herself. The time frame was wrong. But she could have had someone in her pay do it—maybe even one of his own cowhands. Or she could be entirely innocent. Brock’s curses purpled the air. He’d fought his share of battles and won most of them. But this invisible adversary was driving him crazy.
He was going to need help cleaning up this mess and fixing the fence. Bringing his rage under control, he reached for his walkie-talkie and made the call.
* * *
Quicksand was the last of four bulls to be loaded for the rodeo in Gila Bend. At first he balked at the trailer and refused to go up the ramp. Tess feared she might have to give him a touch with the Hot Shot—a risky step that could add to the bull’s stress. But then Ruben had an idea.
Lighting the bundle of sage, he wafted the smoke around and inside the entrance to the trailer. Calmed by the familiar scent, Quicksand allowed himself to be herded up the ramp.
“Make sure you take that sage with us. We might need it.” Tess closed the inside gate, raised the ramp, and locked the back door of the trailer. Ordinarily, Ruben and Pedro would be hauling the bulls to this small-town rodeo. But Tess was anxious to see how Quicksand would perform—more than anxious. A better word would bepetrified.
She climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine. “What will we do if he doesn’t buck?”
“Why worry about something that might not happen?” Ruben responded. “Maybe he’ll buck just fine.”
They arrived at the Gila Bend arena in time to unload the bulls and give them a few hours of rest before the rodeo; bull riding would be the last event. Quicksand, first out of the trailer, bolted into the holding pen, snorting, tossing his head, and pawing at the bed of wood shavings. But the other three bulls, accustomed to the routine, seemed to have a calming effect on him. Once they were all in the pen, he settled down and nibbled the chow set out in one of the rubber tubs.
“Since we didn’t have breakfast, I could use an early lunch,” Ruben said. “There’s a pretty good café in town. Want to come with me for a bite?”
Tess shook her head. “I don’t want to leave Quicksand. You go on. Unhitch the truck and take it if you don’t want to walk that far.”
