Moonrise (5 page)

“B
lack 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.”

So what?
Sam thought. What did price have to do with anything? If the dogs had escaped once, they could do it again.

“Their names are kind of common, but they're bred and trained in Louisiana,” he bragged. “And they cost me a pretty penny, let me tell you. Gator, he's the bluetick, kind of a speckledy one?” Linc looked at Sam and she nodded. “Then there's Bub. He's the pointer, and Shirley is the boss of 'em both, she's the black-and-tan Walker hound.”

“If they turned feral,” Brynna continued coldly, “they would be exceedingly dangerous. They've been trained to hunt, you say, so that's what they'll do. Feral dogs don't have the natural fear of man that wolves and coyotes do.”

Brynna was right. The dogs had scattered only when Jeep had fallen on a member of the pack.

“I'll alert the Elys, Trudy Allen, and Sheriff Ballard—” Brynna began.

“Aw, now, there's no sense doing that,” Linc said.

“It would be negligent not to,” Brynna insisted. “Trudy Allen has that blind foal—”

“I just don't think they'll bother the horses. I think this”—Linc motioned toward Dad—“was a one-shot deal. I mean, horses are just like big dogs, aren't they? I don't see any reason they can't get along.”

Although Brynna's face flushed even darker at Slocum's statement, she didn't bother educating him. She just finished her sentence.

“—and her grandchildren come to visit, too.”

Brynna crossed her arms in a rigid bar at her waist, waiting.

“I promise my dogs won't get out again.” Linc's voice overflowed with mock patience. He raised his right hand as if swearing in court.

“Huntin' dogs want to hunt,” Dad said.

“I've got a dog handler,” Linc protested. “His name's Karl.”

Sam looked over in time to see Brynna's eyebrows arch in surprise.

“He wasn't around today,” Linc said, shrugging. “But Karl keeps them in line.”

Sam had to call Jen. That's all there was to it. Jen lived on Gold Dust Ranch where her dad, Jed Kenworthy, was Slocum's foreman. They'd know the dogs and their handler, Karl. If he even existed.

Judging by Dad's and Brynna's expressions, they
hadn't heard of a newcomer, either.

“I'm going to take this inside, okay?” Sam said, holding up the plant.

“Yeah,” Dad told her, then nodded at Linc and said, “Thanks.”

Sam hurried toward the house. She'd caught Linc Slocum lying more than once. This time it should be easy.

 

Sam's nose tingled at the aroma of the sauce Gram was stirring.

“Oh, yum,” Sam said as she placed the potted plant in the middle of the kitchen table.

“Burritos for dinner,” Gram said. “I should be making better use of that cooking class I took in New Mexico. What do you think?” she asked as Sam stared into the dark-red chili sauce.

“I think I may start drooling if I don't call Jen right now.”

As she dialed, Sam summed up Linc's conversation with Brynna and Dad for Gram.

Gram shook her head. “That man's more irresponsible than a teenager.”

Sam felt her mouth curve in a lopsided smile, but just then Jen answered the phone.

“Have you dried out yet?” Jen teased.

“Oh yeah. You'll never guess what happened on my way home.”

After she told Jen about Dad's accident, Sam asked Jen to tell her all she knew about the dogs and their handler.

Jen hesitated. “I can't say much,” she mumbled. “Mom might think this falls into the ‘don't bite the hand that feeds you' category.”

There was such a thing as being too polite, wasn't there? Sam twisted the phone cord, impatiently.

“Hold on. She's on her way out to hang laundry,” Jen hissed.

“I'm patient,” Sam said between gritted teeth. “I can wait.”

Gram was cutting beef into bite-sized pieces for burritos, but she didn't pretend not to be listening. She smiled when Sam claimed to be patient, then gave her two onions, a cutting board, and a knife.

“So you don't get bored waiting,” Gram said softly, though she knew Sam hated to peel onions.

After a full minute of silence, peeling, and sniffing away tears the onions brought to her eyes, Sam heard Jen take a long breath.

“The guy's a sleaze,” Jen announced.

“It figures,” Sam said. “Why didn't you tell me about him before?”

“I only met him once, and if he's the dogs' handler, he's controlling them—or not—by remote control.”

“What do you mean?”

“Right after Linc hired him, the guy left,” Jen said.

Knife poised in midair, Sam thought that over.

“Mince them,” Gram whispered.

Sam rolled her watering eyes, but she didn't protest. She was too busy wondering why Linc had lied.

“You know how everyone's always saying Linc needs more cowhands, but he doesn't hire any?” Jen asked.

“Except that creep Flick,” Sam put in.

“Right, and—hey, are you crying?” Jen asked incredulously.

“Chopping onions,” Sam said with a sniff.

“Oh, okay. So you know how Flick turned out to be a criminal? This guy Karl—I don't know his last name—is the same sort of lowlife.”

Sam believed her. Though she was only fourteen, Jen had the mind of a scientist. Instead of jumping to conclusions, she analyzed situations. If Jen said Karl the Dog Man was a crook, Sam was 99 percent certain he was.

Sam's pulse seemed to buzz in her wrists.

Linc Slocum had hired Flick to capture the Phantom. Why had he hired Karl?

Sam told herself to stop worrying. Jen had said Karl was gone.

“If this guy comes back, is he a good enough cowboy that he and your dad can handle the Gold Dust herd alone?”

Jen didn't answer. Her words came out in a tumble.

“Mom's done with the laundry and I'm supposed to be dusting furniture. I can see her through the window and she's coming this way. Gotta go.”

Then, just before she hung up, Jen added something Sam couldn't quite make out. As the receiver clicked down, Sam tried to replay the words.

But they didn't make much sense, because it sounded as if Jen had said, “Karl's no cowboy. No way in the whole wide world.”

G
ram looked at Sam with open curiosity.

“So what did Jennifer have to say?” Gram asked as she placed the meat into a cast-iron pot to brown.

“She didn't know much about the dogs or Karl, the guy who's supposed to be their handler. Jen met him, but she said he didn't act like a cowboy and she never saw him work. He was there one day and gone the next.”

Gram didn't comment. She just carried on with dinner.

“Put those”—Gram nodded at the onions Sam had cut—“in with the meat.”

Sam used the dull edge of the knife to sweep the onions off the cutting board and into the pot. As the
onions sputtered, Sam's mind remained on the dogs.

Linc had come close to admitting only Karl knew how to control the hunting hounds. And Jen said he'd vanished. That didn't make sense, and it made her worry.

Of course, Dad, Jed Kenworthy, and the Elys would try to protect the cattle and horses on the three ranches bordering the La Charla River. But what would happen to the mustangs? If those dogs were fearless enough to attack a horse with a rider, tackling a foal would be like play.

The Phantom, New Moon, Yellow Tail, and the other mustang stallions would watch for raids on their bands, but could the foals keep up with a fleeing herd?

Sam gnawed her lower lip. What could she do?

Only when the onions and meat sputtered and a spatter of hot shortening hit her hand did Sam step back.

She almost collided with Blaze. The dog frisked around Dad and Brynna as they came into the kitchen.

“Well, that was a useless apology,” Brynna said.

Dad shrugged. “Might be the best he can do.”

Brynna gave a groan of disbelief.

“Wyatt, he wasn't sorry! Linc Slocum wants what he always does—his own way. He doesn't care about other people, animals, the land, or anything else. And what,” Brynna asked as she pointed an accusing finger at the plant in the middle of the table, “is this about?”

Sam laughed. Brynna was right. Buying a potted plant for Dad was kind of silly.

“I'll rescue the poor thing,” Gram said. “There's a sunny spot in the living room that might suit it.”

“The apology isn't the point,” Brynna said loudly. Then, as if she'd run out of anger, she sank into her chair at the table. She leaned back and tilted her head to look up at Dad. “I wouldn't accept his apology anyway, not when
you
got thrown.”

“Jake was shocked, too,” Sam said.

Dad gave her a wry smile. “So you been announcin' I fell off my horse.”

“Only to Jake,” Sam rushed to tell him. “And only because he trapped those dogs and I thought he should know to be careful.”

“I'm joking, honey. A man's pride don't count for much in a situation like this.”

Was Dad still joking? Sam couldn't tell.

“Where are you hurt?” Brynna asked sternly.

“I've already been seen to by an expert,” Dad said, looking toward Gram as she heated tortillas on a griddle.

Brynna followed Dad's glance. When she still didn't look satisfied, Sam explained what she'd seen.

“Jeep reared and went over backward,” Sam said. As the attack played out in her mind all over again, she used her hand to show the Appaloosa falling like a huge tree. “Dad's shoulder hit first, then he and Jeep sort of pressed the black-and-tan dog—”

“That would be Shirley,” Dad said.

Brynna ignored Dad's light tone.

“So Jeep fell on top of you?” Brynna asked.

“No, I kicked free of the stirrups before my leg got trapped under him. That's why I fell off.” Dad looked thoughtful, as if he was weighing his decision. “If I'd stayed in the saddle, I might have ridden through it. That mighta been best, 'cause it sure scared me when he didn't get up.”

“What?” Sam asked. “It seemed like he got up right away.”

Dad shook his head. “You were busy with Ace. That little mustang wanted to go after those dogs and teach 'em some manners, didn't he?”

Brynna still didn't smile.

“One rein got pinned under Jeep, so he couldn‘t swing his head to get up,” Dad explained. “Took him a minute to figure out what was going on, but he didn't panic. Lucky they were split reins. Soon as I fished that one out from under him, Jeep just lurched up on all fours.”

Brynna's sigh coincided with the arrival of their dinner plates. For a while, Gram's spicy burritos drove out serious conversation.

They lingered over dinner, but conversation was sparse. By the time Gram set a plate of cookies on the table, Dad was ready to talk about the accident again.

“Seemed like an awful long time between knowin'
Jeep would fall and the instant I hit the ground,” Dad said.

“Like slow motion,” Gram agreed. “At the heart of an emergency, time seems to click off one second at a time.”

Dad rubbed the back of his neck. His brown eyes met Sam's. She didn't think she could have looked away if she'd wanted to.

“Here's the thing,” Dad said. “In this sorta life, I could get hurt bad, even killed, any time.”

Sam pushed back from the table. She didn't want to hear this, but Dad's eyes said she'd better not leave.

“I'm careful, sure,” he said. “But total safety's impossible when you do what we do.”

Why was Dad saying this? It was exactly what she tried
not
to think about.

“But job safety's not what I was frettin' about as Jeep was falling,” Dad said with a half smile. “One sentence musta run through my head a dozen times. Know what it was? ‘Oh shoot, I haven't taught her how to run the ranch.'”

The kitchen was quiet except for the coffeepot starting to perk.

Sam's gaze swung to Brynna, but her stepmother shook her head.

“You.” Dad touched Sam's shoulder. “After I'm gone—”

“Dad, do we have to talk about this?” Sam felt
tears prick the corners of her eyes.

For most kids, this conversation would be an ugly “what if” situation. Not for Sam. She knew Dad could die. After all, Mom had.

“Starting tomorrow, I'm gonna start teaching you what it means to be a rancher,” Dad told her.

Sam leaned back against her chair and felt as if she were shrinking. She hadn't even mastered life as a high school student, and now Dad wanted her to learn to take over the ranch.

Is that why Dad had let her go after the horses alone? Because he wanted her to know how to do things in case he died? That was way too much responsibility.

“Now, what else do you want to talk about?” Dad asked.

It was the opening Sam had been waiting for. She pushed aside her fear and started talking.

“Remember when I told you that Jen and I want to go on a campout?”

By the time Sam finished explaining Jen's plan to round up the strays as a Father's Day present, Brynna had gone upstairs to change out of her uniform and Gram was washing dishes.

Dad might have given her an outright “no” if Blaze hadn't jumped to his feet and begun sniffing at the bottom of the kitchen door.

“We'll see how this hound situation plays out, first,” Dad said, distracted. “Just now, Blaze seems to
think we have company.”

Their visitor was Jed Kenworthy. Before he could even knock, Dad slipped outside.

“He doesn't want us in on whatever Jed's gonna tell him. It's got to be about Linc and the dogs, don't you think?” Sam asked Gram.

“You're probably right,” Gram said. “But they've been doing this for years. Whenever there's a decision to be made about ranching, they stroll around, checking fences, looking over the stock, just generally summing things up while they talk. Sometimes they do it at our place and sometimes over at Gold Dust.”

Sam wasn't the only one frustrated by Dad's solitary walk with Jed.

Once she came back downstairs in jeans and saw Dad gone, Brynna paced from the window over the sink to the one in the kitchen door, then back to the big window that wrapped the front of the house and gave the kitchen table its view.

Sam could see only darkness through each one of them, but Brynna kept peeking.

“They can have their conversation without me,” Brynna said, as if convincing herself. “So I'm not going out there.”

At last, Brynna busied herself with phone calls.

“I'm just giving our neighbors a heads-up,” Brynna said as she dialed. “So they know that pack's on the prowl.”

First, she called Three Ponies Ranch, but Jake
had already warned his family. They'd increased the hours each brother spent riding the range, keeping watch over their beef cattle.

Brynna's call worried Mrs. Allen. Just listening to one half of the conversation, Sam could tell Mrs. Allen feared the yapping of her Boston bulldogs, Imp and Angel, might attract the pack of hounds instead of discouraging them.

When Brynna hung up, she turned to Sam and Gram with a bemused smile.

“She's not the sort to just sit and worry, is she?” Brynna said. “Tomorrow, she's going into town to shop for dog repellent, and she's convinced there's something like a bug zapper, built strong enough for dogs.”

“Where would you shop for things like that?” Sam asked, thinking of the campout.

“Don't ask me,” Brynna said.

Gram chuckled. She and Mrs. Allen had recently rekindled an old friendship.

“Trudy Allen is a world-class shopper. If they exist this side of San Francisco, she'll find them.”

When Dad returned to the house, Brynna was first to pounce on him with questions.

“Is Jed going to reinforce the kennel so those deerhounds stay home?” she asked.

“The kennel's sturdy enough to hold them. Linc's the problem.”

“There's a surprise,” Brynna said.

Gram cleared her throat and suppressed a smile as Brynna turned to Sam.

“That was rude of me. I don't mean to set a bad example, Sam.”

“It's not like I wasn't already thinking the same thing,” Sam said.

“Anyway,” Dad continued, “Linc can't stay away from those dogs, but he can't control them, either. Still, Jed thinks Linc's a little shaken up by what happened today.”

“As he should be,” Brynna muttered.

“I'm banking on it,” Dad said, as his attention swung to Sam. “Now, as for your campout, you can go if—”

Sam bounced out of her chair and jumped up and down, celebrating.

“If,” Dad repeated, more loudly.

Sam sat down, but her mind was already spinning ahead. She and Jen would ride for two days, only stopping when they felt like it, sleeping out under the stars with two horses for company. It would be amazing, wonderful, cooler than anything she'd ever done.

But she'd better find out what followed Dad's
if.

Sam settled back into her chair. All three adults watched her with amusement.

“If?” she said patiently, as if she hadn't just rejoiced like a five-year-old.

“You can go if, at the end of two days, I think you're gonna be useful out there.”

“Okay,” Sam said carefully.

“You'd be riding out to do work that should've been done right the first time.”

So you'd better do it right this time
. Sam heard Dad's hint.

“I'm not saying you two can't have some fun out of it, but you've got a lot to learn before you ride out—like ear-tagging a calf, and branding one.”

Sam struggled to freeze her face. Hurting a calf, even for its own good, wasn't her idea of fun. But she couldn't let her city girl squeamishness show.

“Wyatt, end the child's suspense. How are you going to test her usefulness?” Gram asked.

“For the next couple days, you're gonna work for me as if you were on the verge of taking over as head honcho,” Dad said.

Sam did not know what “head honcho” meant, exactly, but it must be someone in charge.

“I'll work
so
hard,” Sam promised.

“Yes, you will,” Dad agreed. “And in between the usual ranch chores, you're gonna polish your roping and learn to earmark our stock.”

“You'll be glad we don't do it the old-fashioned way,” Gram said. “Because one thing I know for sure is Samantha Anne Forster is too softhearted for cropping ears with a pocketknife.”

Sam's hands gripped each other in her lap.

“But we don't do that,” Sam affirmed.

“No, we don't,” Dad said.

“And Jen's dad is okay with this, too?” Sam asked.

“Yep. He thinks most of the strays will belong to the Gold Dust Ranch, since it's their section you'll be riding. I'll send a branding iron along with you, but Jennifer will be marking Gold Dust stock more often than you'll be marking ours.”

Sam's enthusiasm wavered. Earmarking cattle and branding them depended on roping. All her coordination fled when she tried to spin a lasso over her head, then fling it over anything.

Once, Pepper had rigged up a sawhorse with cow horns attached to it and shown her how he'd practiced when he'd decided to be a cowboy. It hadn't worked for her. No matter how often she sent her loop singing toward the mock cow, her rope had wobbled like limp spaghetti. She'd missed every time.

Now she had two days to change all that.

“Wyatt,” Brynna said, “are you patient enough to teach Sam how to rope?”

“Of course.” Dad sounded a bit insulted. “But I'm not going to do it.”

“Dallas—” Gram began, shaking her head.

“Nope,” Dad said. “Seems to me we've got a local expert who knows how to rope, but needs to polish his teaching skills before next week.”

“Jake?” Sam squeaked her amazement.

Not after the way he'd shown off his roping skills today. No way.

She wet her lips and tried not to feel his rope
jerking tight, then dragging her off Ace and into the muddy lake. “Jake's going to teach me to rope?”