Moonrise Page 4

  “It’s okay, Amigo,” she told the old horse, touching his flaxen mane for assurance. “Everything’s okay, except Jake’s apparently gone loco.”

  Chapter Six

  Something big and metal jangled as it was jarred around in the back of the truck. Sam heard a howl and shivered. Then the sounds came together, painting a picture in her mind.

  Dogs in a cage. Those dogs.

  All at once, she was relieved not to be riding Ace. The little horse had wanted to battle them as if they were predators.

  Why were those dogs in Slocum’s truck? And why was Jake driving it?

  You’ll never know if you don’t ask, she told herself, but she couldn’t rush the horses just to satisfy her curiosity.

  The truck stopped about a hundred yards away. Idling, the vehicle sounded like a small factory.

  When all the horses had crossed the bridge and showed no signs of turning back, Sam reined Amigo toward the truck.

  If you didn’t know Jake, his set jaw would just look stubborn, but Sam could tell he wasn’t gloating over driving Slocum’s truck. He was embarrassed by the loud, flashy vehicle.

  The dogs yapped and yodeled as Sam rode closer. Amigo made a cautious, inquiring snort, and Sam felt a bit scared.

  “They can’t get out, can they?” she called.

  Jake rested his arm on the sill of the driver’s window.

  “’Course not,” he said. Hatless, he pushed back a clump of black hair that had fallen over his brow. Sam noticed his faded blue shirtsleeve was rolled up. “Never knew you to be scared of dogs.”

  “Just those dogs,” Sam said. Then, slapping one hand over her nose, she recoiled. “What’s that smell?”

  “Sardines,” Jake said. “They’re hunting dogs. I couldn’t chase ’em down on foot. I tracked ’em so far, then set up their cage—”

  Their cage? Did that mean the dogs were usually kept in it? Despite their ferocity, Sam felt a little sorry for them.

  Jake’s eyes slid sideways from hers, and she guessed he felt the same. “—and used a scent I was pretty sure would carry.”

  “It carries, all right,” Sam said, still cupping her hand over her nose.

  Sam stood in her stirrups to look into the back of the truck, through the narrow bars on the cage. Openmouthed and excited, the dogs wagged their tails.

  Even though they’d probably gulped down the sardines an hour ago, they were panting fish-scented breath.

  Up close, they didn’t look so scary. The black-and-tan hound’s floppy ears and sad-looking eyes made him almost cute. But he’d been the one that had leaped snarling into Jeep’s face and slashed his tender nose.

  “Back by the lake, when you said you were tracking trackers…” Sam paused as Jake began nodding. “They were the reason you went to Gold Dust Ranch? So, they’re Linc Slocum’s dogs?”

  “Yep,” Jake answered.

  “You’re lucky you weren’t riding Witch,” Sam said. She imagined Jake’s Quarter Horse mare trampling the dogs.

  “Not lucky.” Jake’s flat tone hinted he’d caught the dogs with skill and planning. “Also might’ve been a chore to bring ’em home on horseback.”

  Of course. Sam winced at Jake’s logic. It was just that she was so used to picturing him as a rider.

  “They attacked Jeep.”

  Jake interrupted his level stare with a blink, then smiled. “Attack’s a pretty strong word.”

  “Talk to Dad,” Sam said.

  “Wyatt saw it?”

  “Dad was riding Jeep”—Jake’s only sign of surprise was the way his hand lifted from the windowsill, then flattened again, but Sam knew he wanted to hear more—“not far from High Grass Canyon,” she went on. “The whole pack came down from behind him. That black-and-brown one jumped up and bit Jeep on the nose. When Jeep went over backward, Dad went with him. He was thrown clear.”

  Jake gave a quiet whistle of amazement. “Never knew Wyatt to come off a horse ’less he meant to.”

  “I know,” Sam said. “That’s why I’m kinda scared of them.”

  She stared at the dogs again. All three tails wagged furiously at her attention.

  Typical. Jake didn’t ask if Dad was all right. He assumed she’d tell him if there was more he needed to know. Instead, he seemed to mull over the dogs’ behavior.

  “They’re deerhounds,” Jake said slowly. “A blue tick, a Walker, and some kind of pointer.”

  “I don’t care what they are, or why he has them,” Sam snapped.

  “Calm down, Brat.”

  “I’m calm. And I don’t blame the dogs, exactly, but you wouldn’t be so understanding if you’d seen them, Jake.”

  “Like werewolves, were they?” Jake meant it as a joke, but she could tell his heart wasn’t in it. He was as shaken as she was by Dad’s fall.

  “No…like predators,” Sam told him.

  If Jake was right, the dogs had been trained to hunt. Maybe even bred to hunt. And, knowing Slocum, he wasn’t using them the right way.

  “Why does he have them?” Sam asked. “I bet they’re part of some wild scheme like the buffalo.”

  Jake shrugged, but Sam could see that the memory of Slocum’s herd of bison—which he’d purchased to lure hunters to a Wild West resort he was planning—didn’t sit well.

  Linc Slocum had known nothing about the bison. He’d tried to herd them like cattle and they’d escaped.

  Just like these dogs, which might have passed for family pets.

  Yawning, the black-and-white speckled hound collapsed to the floor of the cage and rolled onto its back. Tail wagging, it begged Sam to scratch its belly.

  “I can see through your disguise,” she muttered, then suddenly she remembered the hounds Linc had rented to pursue the cougars last fall.

  They’d been speckled like this dog, and they’d helped Linc corner a mother cougar. He’d shot her, leaving her adolescent cub to fend for himself.

  Sam swallowed hard. She’d been riding Strawberry in Arroyo Azul when the young cougar had pounced.

  She remembered the pain between her shoulder blades and the terror of being overwhelmed by a wild animal.

  No thanks to Linc, she and Strawberry had survived the attack.

  Why couldn’t Linc see that his mistakes led to disaster way too often? Why didn’t he care?

  “Don’t underestimate them,” Sam told Jake. “Those dogs are dangerous.”

  Suddenly the lazing hound jumped to his feet. Then they all began barking. An answering bark came from River Bend Ranch. Blaze was fiercely protective, but he wouldn’t stand a chance against three trained hunters.

  “I’d better get going,” she said, gathering her reins. “But I think you should tell Linc about Dad.”

  Jake opened his mouth to speak, then closed it. He wouldn’t enjoy giving Linc bad news. In fact, he’d hate it. Jake rarely spoke two sentences in a row to anyone. But Sam knew Jake would tell Slocum, because it was the right thing to do.

  As soon as she reached the bridge’s midpoint, Sam’s eyes began searching for Dad. He’d promised to follow her, but once her horse clopped into the ranch yard, Sam realized he was nowhere to be seen.

  The saddle horses had wandered into their pasture on their own, so Sam dismounted and locked the gate behind them.

  It was a mystery how they’d escaped. She examined the lock and it worked the same as always.

  Dad would never forget to lock the gate. Neither would she, or anyone else on the ranch.

  It was a rule of ranch life that open gates stayed open, closed gates stayed closed. You learned the hard way—by wasting hours going after wandering animals—not to forget.

  Sam led Amigo to the hitching rail, tossed his reins over it, then went looking for Dad.

  It wasn’t just because she wanted his words of praise, she told herself. She wondered how he was feeling after that fall.

  Dad wasn’t in the barn, though Penny was, alert and ready to return to the ten-acre pasture. So, Dad hadn’t ridden a
fter her.

  He wasn’t in the tack room, and though she knocked at the bunkhouse door and called for him, there was no answer there, either.

  Dad must be in the house. She’d only made it halfway there, when Gram came out on the porch.

  “You got all of them, I see.” Gram’s arm circled Sam’s shoulders in a hug. “You’ve come a long way since this time last year.”

  Sam smiled so hard, she felt a twinge in her cheeks, but Gram didn’t give her long to gloat.

  “Now, I need you to weed around the base of these morning glories,” Gram said, pointing to vines with tightly closed blue flowers that twined up around the rabbit-proof fence that protected Gram’s garden.

  “Okay,” Sam said. “But where’s Dad? I need to tell him—”

  “And when you’re through with that, weed inside the garden itself, but those are carrots,” she said, pointing to feathery greens just showing above the dirt, “and those are radishes. Don’t pull them up by mistake.”

  “Okay,” Sam said, again, “but shouldn’t I tell Dad—”

  “Then,” Gram continued, with forced patience, “you can bring them some water. Plants can’t pull up roots and go looking for it themselves, you know.”

  “Are you just going to keep giving me chores till I stop asking about Dad?” Sam asked, exasperated.

  “Now, honey, why would I do that?” Gram asked.

  Sam didn’t guess aloud, but she’d bet Dad was taking a forced rest. He might be an adult, but Gram was still his mother.

  “I might as well tell you what I told your father, “Gram admitted. “He’s no good to any of us all crippled up.”

  Gram tried to sound harsh, but Sam wasn’t fooled.

  “You made him take a nap, didn’t you?”

  “I might have suggested a hot shower and some aspirin,” Gram admitted. “And since he was upstairs anyway, I mentioned it would do him good to get off his feet.”

  “I’m amazed, Gram,” Sam said. “Dad never rests.”

  “You’re old enough to know that fall shook him up a bit,” Gram confided.

  Bone-deep fear chilled Sam. It had been years since she’d really thought about something happening to Dad.

  Sam remembered her own awful fall. She’d been unconscious and they’d feared brain damage. And Mom had died from her accident….

  “He’s fine,” Gram insisted, squeezing Sam’s arm. “If you’d heard how many times I had to promise to wake him if he nodded off, you wouldn’t worry a bit.”

  “Shall I go tell him I’m back?” Sam asked.

  Gram shook her head. “I heard him cross the bedroom floor and look out the upstairs window just before you rode in.”

  Sam shivered, but in a good way. It made her proud to know Dad had watched as she brought River Bend’s horses home.

  Chapter Seven

  “Black as midnight with two fine mares running alongside.” Linc Slocum muttered the words as he swung high-gloss Western boots free of his champagne-colored truck.

  Sam was the only one who heard him. Instantly, she knew he was describing New Moon.

  In Gram’s garden, Sam stood and wiped soil-coated hands on her jeans. Who was Linc talking to? It was almost dusk. Gram was inside cooking. Brynna had only been home a few minutes when Dad had whisked her off to the barn. Sam knew they were talking about the dogs and Dad’s accident.

  Linc carried a green plant potted in a white plastic container. Sam guessed it was for Dad’s sickroom. Jake must have told Linc Slocum about the dogs’ attack.

  Forget the carrots and radishes, Sam thought. Before Dad and Brynna confronted Linc about his dogs, she wanted to hear about the Phantom’s son.

  “Anybody here?” Linc called out. Leaving his truck door open, he started across the ranch yard, ankles wobbling.

  “I am,” Sam said. As she hurried toward him she noticed he was wearing even stranger clothes than usual.

  Linc Slocum usually dressed like a city slicker playing cowboy, but today his yellow shirt with its silver-stitched yoke was tucked into pants patterned with tan camouflage. He’d stuffed his pant cuffs into his boots and the material puffed beneath his knees. Did he think he was dressed for hunting?

  “You saw a black mustang?” Sam asked, shooting a quick glance at the barn to verify they were still alone.

  “Yep, never seen this one before. Bet he could give that white stud a run for his money.”

  Sam knew Slocum was trying to taunt her into defending the Phantom, but she refused to take the bait.

  “Where’d you see the black horse?” Sam tried not to sound like she was too interested.

  “Let me think.” Slocum let his eyes focus on space as he trapped the potted plant between his ribs and elbow, then used both hands to heft his belt.

  Strong belt, Sam thought as Linc’s bulging belly lifted with the tooled leather.

  “Here,” he said, straightening a few mashed leaves on the plant before handing it to her.

  Sam took the plant, but she’d bet Gram would say this was a sorry excuse for an apology.

  “Seems to me that crowbait was by that path up to Grass Gulch,” Linc said, finally.

  Crowbait. She hated the expression some people used for wild horses, but she was only distracted for a few seconds.

  There was no Grass Gulch around here.

  “Long Grass Valley?” she suggested.

  “Yeah, that’s it,” Slocum agreed.

  Sam hoped Linc wouldn’t notice her trembling hands as they clutched the plant.

  Dad had been riding out of Long Grass Valley when the dogs had rushed down behind him. Even though she knew Jake had trapped those dogs and she’d seen them caged with her own eyes, Sam worried about New Moon.

  “Linc,” Brynna said as she left the barn and strode across the ranch yard.

  Brynna’s no-nonsense voice sounded like an accusation instead of a greeting. Sam knew she’d hear no more about the black mustang. At least for a while.

  Brynna’s manner was icy. Sam could feel it from here.

  If Linc had arrived ten minutes earlier, he might have had a chance to break the news of his dogs’ mistake to her. But he was too late for that and too early for her anger to have worn off.

  “Now, B.,” Dad cautioned, using his nickname for Brynna. He would have had better luck talking to the barn wall.

  In a khaki uniform with her red hair french braided down her back, Brynna strode toward them.

  Anyone could see Brynna’s anger was still building. For once, Linc seemed to recognize it.

  “I got it coming,” he said when she was still a few yards off. “I want to pay for any inconvenience I’ve caused.”

  Linc fumbled a checkbook out of his pocket.

  Sam couldn’t believe Slocum wasn’t apologizing. Instead, he was trying to pay for Dad’s pain.

  “Uh, and Jed mentioned I might want to bring something, so…” he pointed to the plant Sam held.

  If Sam weren’t so mad, she’d feel sorry for an adult who was so clueless.

  Dad and Brynna stood, speechless, and Linc gave a nervous laugh.

  “Any kinda lecture you want to give me, have at it. Jake Ely says my dogs spooked Wyatt’s horse and left him pickin’ stickers out of his pants. Don’t blame you for being peeved.”

  Then, Linc laughed.

  “Sorry about that.” He cleared his throat, but gloating flavored his apology. Usually it was Linc, not Dad, who found himself afoot on the range. It was clear Linc found the switch amusing.

  Brynna wasn’t laughing. Her freckles disappeared on her scarlet-flushed face. Her lips turned white from pressing together.

  Finally, she spoke.

  “Are you aware”—Brynna’s voice vibrated with rage—“that it’s against state law to hunt deer with dogs?”

  “Yeah, now that you mention it, Jed clued me in, right after I went and bought ’em.”

  Slocum looked down at his boots, shaking his head, then peered up, as if he expected sympathy.


  Fat chance, Sam thought.

  “Not to mention,” Brynna pressed on, “county statutes prohibit dogs from running at large—”

  “Guess I figured you and your boys couldn’t be everywhere at once, now, can ya?”

  Brynna’s eyes widened and her lips parted in disbelief.

  What? Outrage screeched in Sam’s mind. Had Slocum really just admitted he didn’t mind breaking the law, as long as he wasn’t caught and punished?

  “With hundreds of miles of nothing out there…” Slocum gave a short heh, heh sort of laugh, “don’t figure the sheriff’s got time to search me out to enforce that rule.”

  “It’s not a rule,” Brynna corrected him. “It’s a law.”

  Slocum shrugged. “A darned silly law.”

  Sam forgot about asking Linc for more information on New Moon.

  “You wouldn’t think it was silly if you’d seen Dad’s horse fall, like I did.”

  Silence sizzled around them as Linc searched for a comeback.

  “Thing is,” Dad said, at last, “they’re gonna get shot.”

  Linc leaned back, thumbs hooked through his straining belt. “Is that a threat?”

  “’Course not,” Dad said. “But no one takes kindly to dogs bitin’ his livestock.”

  Not to mention what might have happened if Dad had fallen and rolled. What if all the dogs had attacked him at once?

  “But you’d actually shoot my dogs?” Linc persisted.

  “I wouldn’t like doin’ it,” Dad said. “But if they brought down one of my calves or if they were about to attack my horse or yours”—he nodded at Linc—“you bet I would.”

  Linc’s jaw dropped in astonishment.

  “What if they’d spotted a child instead of Wyatt and Jeep?” Brynna’s tone soared uncharacteristically. “Those dogs—” She stopped.

  Dad’s arm circled Brynna’s shoulders, and she took a deep breath. When she continued, she sounded calmer.

  “If your dogs attacked a person, you could be looking at jail time, Linc. If they should go feral—”

  “They won’t,” Linc promised. “They’re valuable dogs.”