Dark Sunshine (9 page)

Now, he'd just dropped Mom's name between them and laughed at some memory that pleased him.

“She named that river, you know.”

“I didn't know!” Sam shook her head. The river had always been called La Charla. She knew it meant “chitchat” in Spanish, and she'd just assumed some lonely explorer had pretended the river's babbling was a voice from home.

“Sure.” He nodded. “Before we got married, it was just River Bend's river. But she acted like it was a friend. When she was expecting you, she had a hard time sleeping.” Dad gave Sam a sudden smile. “She swore you were doing somersaults inside her. So, she'd slip out of bed and walk down to the river. I don't know how many times I found her there, sitting on a rock, watching the moon dance on the little waves.”

Sam's arms wrapped around her ribs. She did the same thing.

“Louise said the sound of the river soothed you, and after she'd sat there a while you'd let her sleep. And then when you were born”—Dad shook his head, as if the rush of memories kept surprising him—“you were a colicky baby. But Louise and I would carry you out in the moonlight and stand by
the river, yawning, and it always settled you down so we could grab a nap before you were hungry again.”

“I didn't know any of that,” Sam said.

“I haven't thought about it for years.” Dad's voice changed as he left the past behind. “Just because I don't blame you doesn't mean I think it's safe. Especially now.”

“Okay,” Sam said. She didn't mind the warning. Dad had just given her a whole new picture of her mother.

Dad cleared his throat and picked up Jingles, the black plush horse that spent his days posed on Sam's pillow.

“What's had you tossing and turning ever since you came in here?” he asked. Dad's index finger touched the gold bells stitched to the toy's saddle. “I figured unless you had ants in your bed, you were stewing about something.”

Dad looked up at her then, expecting her to explain.

“I know how to work with Dark Sunshine,” she said. “You know how she keeps staring into the barn. I mean, it's natural, since the people who adopted her kept her in a windowless stall.”

“Where'd you come by that information?”

“Brynna,” Sam said. She hurried, hoping Dad wouldn't point out that Dark Sunshine wasn't there to stay. “And I know how to start gentling her.”

“How's that?”

“I could spend Friday night with her in the round corral. We'll put Ace and Sweetheart out in the barn pasture since the fence is fixed, and we'll put Popcorn, alone, in the little corral off the barn.”

Dad didn't tell her that she was insane, or that the mare had to go. He just gave Jingles a shake and listened.

“What I'd do is sit with her, then do that herd mirroring thing Jake had me do with Blackie after we'd first weaned him. Remember?”

It was hard to believe the small and scared colt had grown up to be the Phantom, but Sam knew her patient care and attention then had knit the bond that connected them now.

Dad sighed. “Most days it seems a long time since you and that horse were little, but I can still see you in pigtails, following Blackie around when he walked away, then letting him follow you when he needed a leader.”

“It worked pretty well, didn't it?” Sam whispered. She wondered if she had her Mom to thank for Dad's unusual patience tonight.

“Yeah, but Blackie was hand-raised, not born wild and abused. One more thing you don't want to forget: Blackie belonged to you.”

“Yeah.” Sam let the word stretch out.

“I suppose Brynna's mentioned the foster care deal?”

Sam bit her lip. Brynna hadn't. Was Dad talking
about Mikki or Dark Sunshine?

“No, huh? I suppose there's no harm in telling you. She's put through paperwork for us to foster the mare. They do it with orphan foals more often, but there's provisions for adult horses, too. We get paid for helpin' her back to normal.”

Sam didn't ask for details, and she didn't bounce on the bed and squeal with joy. She only said, “Oh, wow.”

“Someone could still show up with title to that horse,” Dad cautioned. “A bill of sale would supersede BLM's agreement with us.”

“No one will,” Sam insisted. “You know it, Dad. Anyone who's treated her this way doesn't care.”

Dad patted her back as if he were searching for words to explain. “Sometimes people want things just to own 'em. It's not fair and it's not right, but they don't know better than to abuse what's theirs. Look at Mikki.” Dad shook his head. “That child's had hard use, too.”

To Sam, the buckskin was the more likable of the two, but she didn't say it. And the longer she kept her opinion inside, the more clearly she saw how both Mikki and the mare refused to show when they were afraid.

“I guess Mikki's no more to blame for her ugly attitude than Sunshine,” Sam admitted.

Dad put Jingles back on the pillow and gave Sam
another pat on the back as he rose.

“Get to sleep, now,” he said. “You're going to need lots of energy if you plan to have a slumber party with a wild horse.”

“I
'
M NOT AFRAID
of rats or snakes,” Sam said. “I just don't like being surprised.” Sam hesitated outside the door of the old bus and rubbed her arms free of goose bumps. She couldn't hear anything moving in there, but it looked like a great hiding place for things she'd rather avoid.

Minutes ago, she'd stood in the sunlight that bathed the empty trap at Lost Canyon in autumn gold. Crowded with sagebrush and piñon pine, the old wood had looked picturesque. Only the feed sack cover for the missing truck seemed creepy. She and Jen weren't scared—the place was obviously deserted.

Feeling adventurous, they'd tied their horses at the trap—which was disappointingly free of yellow crime scene tape—and hiked in the direction Sam had seen the cowboy go to retrieve his whip. That's how they'd found the old bus wedged into a narrow chasm.

“Well, I
am
afraid of rats and snakes,” Jen admitted suddenly. “Nerve toxins and bubonic plague are things I'd rather enjoy through a microscope.”

“The rangers have already been out here, and they probably disturbed whatever animals were living inside,” Sam reasoned.

Jen gave Sam a lopsided smile. “Oh, good. Now they're ticked off and ready to protect their home.”

Sam considered the bus again. Painted a pale blue that had faded almost to white, it was obviously not a school bus. Jen had suggested it was a prison bus for shuttling convicts between jail and work crew chores. Whatever its former purpose, someone had positioned it in this natural niche so that the windows on one side were smack against the hillside. The side she and Jen could see was creased and rusty.

They'd thought it was long abandoned, until Jen noticed clothes tucked into windows in place of curtains and Sam saw the path worn to the door, which was folded halfway open.

“Okay, we don't have to go in,” Sam said.

“Of course we do,” Jen said. “The rustlers probably holed up here between horse trappings. We might find something the rangers overlooked.”

“Not likely.”

“But possible,” Jen insisted. “It'd be great if we found something with a name on it.”

“Oh, and how about an address, too?” Sam said. “A driver's license would be good. Then the rangers
could just cruise over and pick them up.”

“You're getting as sarcastic as me,” Jen said, crossing her arms. “So knock it off. I just want the rustlers caught so that you don't have to keep looking over your shoulder all the time. Which reminds me…”

“Yes?” Sam couldn't help looking back down the canyon toward the trap.

“Does your dad know where you are?”

“He wasn't home. He doesn't get a half day off like we do. And I told Gram I was going riding with you.” Sam smiled, but Jen's implication gave her chills.

“So no one knows where we are.” Jen gave her voice a ghost story waver.

“Who did you expect me to tell—Jake?”

“No. Definitely no.” Jen squared off, facing the bus door, then tugged Sam's shirtsleeve. “After you, Nancy Drew.”

Sam pushed the door open the rest of the way and jogged up the stairs. Something
did
skitter inside, but Sam was more aware of the odor.

“Yuck, it smells like old sweaty socks.” She grimaced.

“Mixed with a lingering aroma of canned chili.” Jen moved ahead of Sam and nodded to tin cans scattered under a blanket-covered bus bench.

They both looked down the aisle. It was clear, almost as if it had been swept, but some seats leaned
at weird angles and several had come unbolted from the floor.

Sam was wondering if the bus had rolled down there from the highway, when Jen took a squeaky breath and pointed.

“Behind you.”

Sam whirled, gasping.

And saw nothing.

“Ow! You stomped on me!” Jen complained.

“Serves you right.” Sam panted. “What are you looking at? I don't see anything.” Sam scanned the driver's seat, the speedometer, a sun-cracked plastic frame where the driver's license was supposed to go.

“That,” Jen said.

On the shallow shelf below the driver's mirror, Sam finally saw what Jen had spotted.

An empty cottage cheese carton held water with something floating on the top. It wasn't cottage cheese. Next to the carton sat a man's razor with gross bits of whisker still clinging to it.

Jen edged past Sam for a closer look.

She was welcome to it, Sam thought as she backed away and started back down the center aisle. This was ridiculous. What did they think they were going to find?

Sam looked to her right. A seat held two sleeping bags, one ripped with fluffy stuff poking out. She looked left. A coiled rope hung over a seat back and a glove lay on the bench part.

The floor slanted beneath her feet. The bus must have a flat tire on this side. Sam started to grab a seat back for balance, when Jen's voice startled her again.

“Don't touch anything,” Jen said. “Just in case they haven't fingerprinted.”

“You watch too much television,” Sam grumbled.

That's when a shiny mouse ran over her left boot toe and ducked under the jean hem on her right leg.

“Oh, no!” Sam bawled.

She stamped. The mouse fell.

He scurried back the way he'd come. Sam shuffled and scooted her feet, trying not to crush him. Her foot slid out from under her and she stumbled, landing facedown.

“Don't touch anything!” Jen yelled again.

“Tell that to the paramedics when they arrive,” Sam mumbled.

Jen moaned, and Sam felt her friend's footsteps pound closer. She'd frightened Jen, and that wasn't very nice. But Sam wasn't feeling nice. She lay in the aisle of this convict bus, with the breath knocked from her chest. She needed to do a push-up to get upright, but she didn't like the idea of pressing her bare hands against this floor.

From her position, she saw the undersides of seats. No gum, just cobwebs and red-brown rust where a metal seat support had cracked, showing a corner of yellow paper.

Sam closed her eyes, then opened them.

“Are you okay? Sam, do you have a concussion or something?” Jen squatted nearby.

“I see something?”

Jen sat quiet for a minute. “Why are you asking me? Sam, you'd better be all right. I can't carry you down to—”

“You don't have to.” Sam flipped into a seated position before she delicately removed a piece of paper that had been rolled and slipped inside the metal tube.

“Oh, wow.” Jen sighed, and they read it together.

 

Gold for $125 and barter goods
I bukskin mere,
3yrs old and tack
to certis Flickinger

 

“I can't read the signature,” Jen said, “but this guy needs some help in English.”

Sam read the words again.

“It's signed by Rose Bloom. See the
B
there? She's the lady who adopted Dark Sunshine and got title to her a few months ago. That's what Brynna said.”

This bill of sale proved Dark Sunshine belonged to someone named Certis Flickinger. He had to be one of the rustlers.

“What are you going to do?” Jen asked, and Sam
wanted to hug her. This is what made Jen a best friend.

Jen wouldn't give advice until she was asked. They both knew they should turn the bill of sale over to someone in authority, and they both knew the horse would suffer even more if they did.

“What do you think?” Sam asked.

“I think that looks like a carbon copy,” Jen said, “and Rose Bloom has the original, so you can't keep it a secret forever.”

“I wouldn't do that.” Sam folded the yellow paper into a square and tucked it inside her front pocket. “But I do want to think about it a little while.”

Sam checked Jen's expression. Inside a frame of blond braids, Jen's face had turned serious. Jen was a math whiz with a knack for logical, well-ordered thinking. If there was a flaw in waiting, Jen's analytical mind would find it.

Outside, a breeze blew and a branch of sagebrush tapped against the bus. Finally, Jen shook her head.

“Other than the tiny chance we're being watched right now by federal rangers—and I think Ace and Silly would have let us know if they'd sensed them—I see no problem with waiting.” Jen rubbed her hands together and stared at them, still thinking. “After all, we are juveniles…”

“And we can't be expected to know this is important?” Sam suggested.

“They're not going to buy that, Samantha Anne.
Otherwise, why would we take it?”

“You're right.” Sam ignored Jen's gesture that said
as usual
. “Let's get out of here. I'm supposed to be home in time to help Jake with Mikki.”

Leading the way back to the door, Jen said, “Just don't tell Jake.”

“Not in this lifetime,” Sam promised. But by the time they'd made their way off the bus and back to the horses, Sam thought she might ask Jake what he'd overheard when he was hanging out with the official trackers.

After all, it couldn't hurt.

 

Sam reined Ace aside and waited for the gray van to cross the River Bend bridge. Even from there, she heard Dark Sunshine's worried whinny.

As Sam rode into the ranch yard, she saw why.

Far back by the barn, Jake stood between Witch and Sweetheart. With Sam on Ace and Sweetheart outside the barn corral, Dark Sunshine felt abandoned by her new herd.

Right in front of Sam was another surprise. Mikki, who'd just arrived, was talking with Pepper.

Mikki wore jeans and a black tee shirt stenciled with the word “Misfit.” Whether it was the name of a band or a description of the wearer, Mikki had better be nice to Pepper.

Sam shook her head at her own silliness. Why should she feel protective of a cowboy talking to an
eleven-year-old girl?

Because she really liked him. Pepper, with his red-blond hair and gangly legs, was only seventeen, but he wasn't quiet like Dallas or Ross, River Bend's other hands. He didn't offer Sam extra care because she was the boss's daughter or scoff because she'd been a city girl.

Pepper just accepted Sam. His winks, nods, and the stampede string he'd made for her hat had kept Sam's spirits high while she was relearning her place at home.

As Sam rode close enough to eavesdrop, she heard Mikki ask why Pepper had become a cowboy.

“No choice,” Pepper said with a slow smile.

“What does that mean?” Mikki demanded.

“I'm too lazy to work and too nervous to steal,” Pepper answered.

Mikki laughed, but Sam winced with uneasiness. The bill of sale in her pocket and the technically stolen horse in a River Bend corral might make her a thief, but Pepper shouldn't be joking with Mikki about stealing.

But hadn't Mikki been a runaway? Pepper had been, too, when he'd first come to the ranch. Maybe he and Mikki could find things in common.

Before she dismounted to join in the conversation, Sam saw Jake hailing her from the barn.

Sam rode back to him. Jake was already dusty, as
if he'd been working. He'd loosened Witch's cinch, too, so the horse could relax.

Sweetheart was saddled. Had Jake used his half day off to work while she'd gone riding with Jen?

“I've been working with Popcorn,” he said. “I've got him haltered.”

“Jake, that's great.”

He shrugged. “It's the horse, not me. He's sweet as pie.” Then Jake's mouth twisted in irritation. “She probably
will
ride him before she leaves.”

Looking embarrassed, Jake changed the subject. “Leave Ace tacked up so you can help me switch the buckskin and Popcorn after she's done working with him.”

Sam noticed that Jake had avoided using Mikki's name.

“You still feel uneasy about her,” Sam said.

“I arranged for the van driver to come back late so she could make some real progress today.” He sounded a little defensive.

“But you still don't trust her, right?” Sam asked.

“I won't talk about it.”

Sam took a breath, then let it go. “How about your tracking trip? Will you talk about that?”

Jake's face lit with a rare smile. “Later,” he promised, and began walking toward the round pen.

“What, are you like a cop-in-training now?” she teased.

“Later.” Jake shot Sam a look meant to silence her.

It didn't work.

“Jake, was it really cool? Tell me.”

“If I
were
training as a cop, first thing I'd do is put you under house arrest.”

“I haven't done anything!” Sam felt a zing of worry.

There was no way Jake could know what was in her pocket.

“Unless your fool idea of spending the night with that mare counts.” At her silence, Jake looked smug. “Your dad called and told me about it this morning while you were waiting at the bus stop.”

Jake never missed a chance to gloat. While it took Sam over an hour to reach Darton High on the bus, he made it in half that time, driving in with his brother.

All of a sudden, that didn't matter. Sam had to know if she was rushing Dark Sunshine. If her idea was a mistake, Jake would tell her.

“Jake.” She grabbed his forearm, tightening her grip when he tried to shake her off. “I'm only going to keep Sunny company in the dark and mirror her movements, like you taught me. That's all. What do you think? Really.”

Sam released Jake's arm. He looked down, then rubbed the back of his neck in a thoughtful gesture.

“I think it's a good idea for the horse,” he said. “I'm not so sure about you.”

“You know I'm careful around horses.”

“Bloody noses and black eyes. Shoot, now.” Jake pretended to frown in confusion. “Who
was
that I saw, if not you?”

Sam was sticking her tongue out at Jake when she felt Mikki's stare. Maybe it would be good for Mikki to see it was possible to disagree with a man and not fight.