The Wild One Read online

  Sam threw back the covers, pulled on her pink robe, and crept down the hall. Quietly, she left the house.

  As Sam closed the front door, the river shushed her. Crickets stopped chirping as if they were holding their breaths.

  River Bend Ranch had no outside lights and she’d left the porch light off. Little by little, Sam’s eyes grew used to the dark. A full moon turned the ranch grounds the black and white of an old photograph.

  Sam stepped off the porch. Ahead, the sand and gravel driveway unrolled like a white velvet carpet leading to dark hills beyond the ranch gate. Night sky arched overhead with stars so bright, Sam picked out the Big Dipper instantly. A low nicker drew Sam’s attention to the ten-acre pasture. It lay in a dark rectangle and horses moved across it in dreamy slowness.

  And then a shower of gravel against rock made the horses jerk alert. One snorted. Another shied. They all looked toward the river.

  Sam ran on tiptoe, wincing as pebbles jabbed her bare feet. The horses moved in a silent wave toward the far end of the pasture. Sam’s toes jammed against a round rock and she almost stumbled. The horses broke into a trot and Sam ran faster, ignoring the stabbing stones.

  The river rushed like wind as she neared it. When she saw him, Sam stopped.

  Floating like a ghost, the stallion picked his way down the hillside on the other side of the river. His mane and tail rippled around him. His hooves were so soundless, he seemed to drift above the ground.

  Would he jump the fence into the pasture? Would he clop across the wooden bridge or wade across the river?

  The stallion reached the river and stopped.

  Sam’s pulse pounded. She couldn’t believe this. The moonlight must be magical. She’d read myths of maidens who summoned unicorns, but Samantha Anne Forster was no fairy-tale princess.

  The stallion didn’t care. He splashed into the water, coming to her.

  His hooves grated on river rock. Halfway across, he stood still, knee-deep in his own reflection. This close, Sam could see the stallion wasn’t white. His hide was dappled gray and silver, like the surface of the moon. He was the same stallion who’d rescued the herd this morning.

  Sam didn’t move. She barely breathed.

  The stallion’s nostrils flared, drawing in her scent. For a moment, he lifted his head, testing the breeze, and then his eyes returned to her.

  Sam’s heart thudded so hard she feared the stallion heard. Only one horse had ever studied her with such friendship.

  If this was a dream, Sam never wanted to wake.

  The stallion arched his neck and pawed three times.

  Water drops scattered like diamonds.

  What did he want? He was a mustang, a wild thing. If she whispered or held out her hand, he’d run. Then it struck her. What if he was hers? What if he was Smoke’s son, a black colt turned white?

  Sam had no chance to find out. As if he’d read her mind, the stallion flung his head high. Water churned as he wheeled on his hind legs and launched onto the bank in a single leap.

  Mist hung where he had been. The river flowed smooth again and the crickets chirped.

  No one could know the stallion had stood there.

  Except for Sam. She knew the truth. The truth was, her dream had come true.

  By moonlight, Zanzibar had returned to her, at last.

  Chapter Four

  GRAM PULLED THE PILLOW off Sam’s head and kissed her cheek. “Good morning,” she said.

  Sam wasn’t so sure. When she gazed out her bedroom window, it still looked like night.

  Minutes later, Sam sat beside Gram in the white van, which served as a modern chuck wagon. Sam focused on the red taillights bobbing on the road ahead. Jake and Dad drove the truck and pulled a horse trailer big enough to carry Ace, Dad’s horse, Banjo, and Jake’s black mare, Witch.

  Sam stayed awake long enough to drink the cocoa Gram had insisted she bring. As soon as her eyelids closed, though, she imagined a silver stallion. Wild as the wind, he’d returned to River Bend on the same night she had. He was Zanzibar, she thought drowsily, and he was real.

  Sam slept through much of the drive to Red Rock, where Dad’s three cowboys had joined Linc Slocum’s men to gather range cattle from both ranches into a single large herd.

  When Sam awoke, they’d arrived and Gram was hustling her out of the van.

  Hundreds of cattle, mothers and calves with fuzzy red-brown fur and white faces, were mooing and bawling, worried by the two trucks and the men on horseback.

  Sam climbed out, feeling a little shy. She shouldn’t. Many of these cattle belonged to her family, but she’d been too young to go on drives before. Now her time in the city made her feel like an outsider.

  Then Gram stood beside her, indicating which cowboys rode for Dad.

  “Dallas has been on the River Bend for years,” Gram said. “You probably remember him.”

  Sam did, and she smiled. The gray-haired man was the only cowboy on foot. He stood talking to Dad. Sam thought his bowed legs looked better suited to gripping a horse than walking.

  “And that’s Ross.” Gram nodded to a man sitting tall in the saddle of a Quarter horse. “That man is so quiet, he hardly talks to anyone, even your father.”

  Pepper was the youngest cowboy, nicknamed for his chili pepper red hair. He glanced at Sam, then looked away.

  “How old is he?” Sam asked. “He looks like a kid.”

  “A year older than Jake,” Gram said with a sigh. “That boy ran away from his home in Idaho. Far north in Idaho, near the Canadian border. Said it was too cold.” Gram smiled and lowered her voice. “He has no idea your father tracked down his parents to tell them he was okay.”

  As Sam pulled on her favorite black sweater, she felt a surge of pride in her father. She ran the names through her mind once more. Dallas. Ross. Pepper.

  They’d all eat dinner together tonight and she’d have to start learning the other cowboys’ names, too.

  Gram would cook for all of them. Each day, she’d drive the van to the place where the crew would camp for the night. She’d arrive hours before the slow-moving cattle.

  Gram would get the gear down from the carrier atop the van and she’d pitch the tents. Next, she’d build a campfire. She’d roast meat over the fire, but she’d cook the rest of the meal on a stove in the back of the chuck wagon. By the time the herd arrived, the cowboys would just have time to clean up for dinner.

  Gram’s job sounded like a lot of work. Riding Ace all day and watching the cattle trot back toward their summer pastures at River Bend sounded like a vacation.

  “Hey, princess.” Jake’s joking voice made Sam turn. “Think you can give me a hand with these horses?”

  The cowboys were watching. Sam could feel them wondering how Wyatt Forster’s city slicker daughter would do.

  What if Ace tossed his head too high for her to reach? Or refused the bit? If he planted a hoof on the toe of her new boot and wouldn’t move, could she keep from yelping?

  The River Bend cowboys might not mock her, but Linc Slocum’s men could be a different story.

  Sam shot a quick glance their way. She probably just imagined their sneers.

  Jake had unloaded all three horses and tied their lead ropes to rings on the trailer. Now he carried a saddle on each arm, as if they didn’t weigh an ounce. As Sam moved in next to him, Ace swung his head around as far as the rope allowed. His warm breath clouded the cold morning air. He nuzzled her arm.

  Surprised and pleased, Sam rubbed the gelding’s brown neck. He knew her.

  “Good boy,” she said, then turned to Jake. “Where’s Ace’s bridle?”

  Sam reached up to lift the halter off the bay’s head.

  “Put that back on,” Jake ordered as he handed her Ace’s bridle. “Put this on over the halter and get a bit in his mouth before you untie him.” Jake shook his head. “You don’t want him hightailing it out of here before you can say good-bye.”

  “I don’t need lessons,” Sam muttered.


  She did it Jake’s way, even though Ace was so well behaved, she didn’t need to.

  With the feel of eyes watching each move, Sam smoothed on Ace’s saddle blanket. Bracing her arm muscles, she grabbed the saddle and swung it into place on Ace’s back.

  As she tightened the cinch, she felt smug.

  As she tucked her boot in the stirrup, she was confident.

  But when she placed all her weight on that stirrup and started to vault up into the saddle, it slipped sideways. Sam wished she could turn invisible.

  The cowboys laughed.

  Though she jerked her boot free of the stirrup and hopped back quick enough to keep from falling, she must’ve looked real funny.

  “Happens all the time, honey.” Dad was beside her right away.

  “I know,” Sam said. She didn’t want sympathy.

  “Oldest trick that pony has,” Dallas added.

  “I know that,” Sam repeated. And she did.

  Yesterday, she’d checked Ace’s belly to see if he’d puffed up so the cinch would hang loose when he released his breath. Today, she’d trusted him.

  She bent to lift the saddle. When she heard movement, she looked over her shoulder to see Jake step forward, as if to help.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she muttered.

  Jake held his hands up as if holding off an attack, and stepped back again.

  Sam didn’t need a mirror to know she was blushing.

  Once she put the saddle right, she tapped Ace’s belly to make him exhale, then pulled the cinch snug. Ace stamped one hoof and swung his head around to give her a glare.

  She looked him right in the eyes.

  “Look insulted all you want,” she whispered. “But if you won’t trust me, I can’t trust you.”

  Ace’s black-tipped ears flicked back and forth, waiting for another word. But Sam was done talking.

  Once in the saddle, she consulted her watch, just to avoid the cowboys’ amused eyes. It was only seven o’clock in the morning.

  Because her face was still so tight and hot it hurt, riding out on her first cattle drive wasn’t as much fun as she’d expected.

  Gram waved and the cows and calves increased their calls to a moo racket she never could have imagined. All the animals wore Slocum’s double-S brand, or the backward F for Forster. The herd strung out across the range, until they stretched about a quarter mile in front of Sam and Ace. The riders moved into a rough formation around the herd.

  Dad rode in front on Banjo. A few cowboys rode on each side. Sam, half hidden in dust, brought up the rear.

  A few times, she tried to ride closer to the other riders, but Linc Slocum’s big palomino struck out with a hoof, trying to kick Ace.

  “Sorry, little lady,” Slocum said, with his toothpaste-commercial grin.

  Slocum wore snakeskin boots, brass-rowelled spurs, and a long, brown duster more appropriate for Hollywood than rural Nevada.

  His too-friendly attitude might have bothered her more, except that other riders were unwilling to talk. And when she rode too close to Jake, Witch whirled with her mouth open, looking as if she’d peel Ace’s nose with her bared teeth.

  Sam reined Ace in, urging him away from danger. He thanked her by giving a buck. Sam’s teeth clacked together. Before she remembered not to, she grabbed the saddle horn for balance. By the time Ace quit pulling against the bit, dancing as if he wanted to run for home, they were bringing up the rear, again.

  So this was her dream come true. Samantha Forster, the boss’s daughter, blinked against the dust raised by hundreds of hooves. She stayed there all morning as the herd headed west, toward the Calico Mountains.

  Sam had just looked up at the sun, directly overhead, when Jake appeared, making Witch walk beside Ace, whether or not she wanted to.

  “We’re not stopping for lunch,” Jake said. “I have some jerky in my saddlebags, though, if you’re hungry.”

  “I’m fine,” Sam said, even though she had nothing but the water in her canteen, and it tasted metallic and warm.

  She didn’t care about lunch. She only cared about riding well enough to return to the range in search of the Phantom. So far, she wasn’t doing so well.

  Since it was getting hot, Sam wiggled out of her black sweater and tied it around her waist. She settled her old brown felt cowboy hat with one hand. It still fit after two years. She peered out from its shade.

  Sam tried to read Jake’s expression, but his lean jaw stayed in its usual set position and he looked straight ahead. Would he mention her terrible morning and say she had a long way to go before she was the rider she used to be?

  Sam wouldn’t give him a chance.

  “How old are these calves?” she blurted, pointing at the leggy babies, walking beside their mothers. Most weren’t as tall as a Labrador retriever.

  “A couple months old,” Jake said. “We wait ’til they’ve all been dropped before we move them.”

  To Sam, dropped seemed a strange word for being born, especially because cows were such gentle mothers.

  Now, for instance, she saw a cow stop and use her huge pink tongue to wash her calf’s face. The herd flowed around her on both sides, but she cleaned her baby as the other cattle passed her by.

  As soon as the cow and calf stood alone, Ace bolted forward, as if to chase her, and Sam drew the reins tight.

  “You need to keep loose reins on a cow horse. Remember?” Jake said. He still didn’t look at her, and he said it so quietly, no one else could have heard.

  “Every time I loosen up, he goes his own way,” she admitted.

  When Jake said nothing, she decided he was only trying to help. She bit the inside of her cheek and loosened the reins.

  Ace bolted into a jouncing trot.

  “Relax. You’re not riding in a horse show. Don’t grab that horn again, Samantha. What are you thinking?”

  She was thinking that her new horse hated her.

  Ace veered away from the herd and lengthened his stride. Sam jerked the reins tight again.

  She didn’t speak when Jake stopped his horse, too. She couldn’t risk sounding weepy.

  Jake bumped his black hat away from his serious brown eyes.

  Mustang eyes. When they were kids, Jake had told her Shoshone tales. One story described the old times when humans were animals. Ten-year-old Jake, with his glossy black hair and lively leaps, just knew he’d been a mustang in the old times. He’d been equally convinced Sam was once a mosquito—a buzzing, troublesome pest.

  Now, Jake looked at her with frustration, as if he might still believe it.

  “What?” she demanded. After a single day on the ranch, she was sick of trying to prove herself.

  “Nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing. Didn’t you outgrow that?”

  He shrugged with a teasing grin, as if he remembered their kid days, too. Half of Sam wanted to go back to being playmates. Half of her wanted to confide in Jake. He was older, and a wizard with horses. He’d know what to do about the silver stallion.

  But she’d waited too long. Jake tugged his hat back over his eyes. All business, he nodded toward her horse.

  “Ace is testing you, is all,” Jake said. “Hang in there.”

  He rode on ahead.

  Any curl that had ever been in Sam’s hair was gone. The short wisps hung into her eyes. She needed lip balm for the dry skin on her mouth and her cheeks felt chalky with desert dirt.

  At first, she thought the white triangles ahead looked like teeth poking up out of the sand and sagebrush. She squinted and blinked. Finally, she recognized the tents and Gram’s chuck wagon. Then she caught the aroma of baking biscuits.

  This time when Sam loosened her reins, Ace read her mind. He trotted past the cattle, past the cowboys, past Dad, whom she hadn’t seen since morning.

  With a rolling hand motion, Dad was instructing the cowboys to urge the cattle into the tight herd they’d been in this morning.

  Rejuvenated by the smells ahead
, Sam winked at Dad and pointed at the herd.

  “I’m going to leave this to you professionals,” she said. As she moved off, Dad gave a short laugh.

  Longing for a cold soda, Sam let Ace swing into a lope, and settled back into the saddle. This time, the signal made him stop short in a haze of dust.

  “Careful of my campfire,” Gram scolded, but she didn’t sound cranky. She looked neat, with a white apron over her jeans, as she pointed toward an enclosure made of portable plastic fence. “Follow Pepper,” she added.

  The young red-haired cowboy had dismounted. He unsaddled his dun gelding next to the corral and left his reins trailing on the dirt. Ground-tying, it was called. Cowboys trained their mounts to stay around, without being tied, but Sam didn’t think it would work with Ace.

  Before she could give it a try, Jake appeared to stand at Ace’s head.

  “Thanks,” Sam said, but she got the distinct feeling that Jake was baby-sitting her. She’d swung one leg toward the ground when she heard him mumble something that sounded like, “Long ride,” but she wasn’t sure enough to answer.

  He added something she did hear.

  “Your knees are apt to be a bit wobbly.”

  “I’m fine,” Sam insisted.

  The warning irritated her, mostly because it was true. She’d been in the saddle for nine hours and Jake knew she wasn’t used to it. As her boots touched the ground, her legs felt liquid and unsteady. She hated to use Ace for balance, but it was better than falling over backward.

  The chores of checking Ace’s feet, of unsaddling, and juggling that floppy gate before she turned him out, loomed like the task of climbing a mountain.

  “I’ll take him,” Jake offered.

  “Fat chance,” Sam said. As she lifted her chin to look up at him, her hat slipped off her hair. She caught it and slammed it back on her head.

  “If there’s one thing I know, it’s to take care of my horse before I pamper myself,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how much I want to pry off these boots or wash my face. Ace comes first.”

  For a minute, she thought Jake would give her a pat on the back. He didn’t, but the satisfied look on his face was enough.