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The lion’s body would keep away any stallion that might snap the foal’s neck to put it out of its misery. Odds were slim that another mountain lion would come along. Therefore, it would have a slow death unless Jake did something.
If you have a grain of sense in your head, Hawthorne, you’ll jack in one more round and send the pathetic little bag of bones to the great grassy pasture in the sky. You’d be cruel not to do it.
True, but he’d already made the decision. He’d sacrificed the mountain lion’s beauty and wildness for the foal, so now he’d have to step up and take care of it, no matter how slim its chances. “Well, shit.”
He scanned both ways along the steep hillside for any sign of a trail that would take him down. “Come on, Stoney, my man. We’re in the nursery business now.”
He thought he could see a faint trail that the wild horses made to get down from this ridge, going to water at the small runoff lake at the bottom of the hill. He started down, leading his horse. A rock rolled out from under his feet and Stoney’s hind feet scrabbled in the gravel for purchase on the slope.
They’d have to find another way back to the road—that was for damn sure. This steep grade would be way too hard to negotiate while carrying the foal.
They finally got to the bottom and the baby turned its head to look at Jake. Weakly, it stumbled closer to the mare’s body, instinctively knowing that of the four enemies existing for wild horses—man, fire, drought and mountain lions—man was the most dangerous.
It was a filly, huddled here in a little brushy cove protected by the mountains surrounding it on three sides, where the mare had come with her. Maybe she was one of those wild mares that liked to change stallion bands every once in awhile. She’d been killed by a falling rock that rolled about a yard away after crushing half her head.
The foal’s knees buckled and she collapsed in a heap. Her spirit was what was strong about her; it showed in her eyes. But her body was dehydrated and weak. She might not even live until they got home.
Jake went back to Stoney and led him over to the baby, picked her up, and laid her, belly-down, over the big gray’s withers, feet hanging off on either side. He steadied her with his rein hand as he caught the horn with the other and the stirrup with his toe to swing up into the saddle.
Then he smooched to the gelding and started looking for a way out.
CLEA DROVE with both hands on the steering wheel as if that could make up for not keeping her eyes strictly on the two-lane road. The enormous land and sky overwhelmed her, just as they had that day during the ski trip when Brock had immersed himself in business as usual and she’d driven miles and miles alone in a rental car, exploring Montana.
Looking for something; she didn’t know what.
That day had been the beginning of the end.
She’d waked to hear Brock in the other room, dressing down somebody over the phone, cursing and demanding and then changing calls and becoming charming as he tried to make a deal. She lay there and listened to him. From what he said she knew that he’d be at it all day. The last day of the romantic vacation trip he’d given her for Valentine’s Day.
Which was the first romantic gesture he’d bothered to make in ages. Which was just as well because she could hardly stand him anymore.
She ran from the sound of his voice—into the shower, then into the dressing room where she tried to distract herself by choosing exactly the right items from her extensive new ski wardrobe. Her ski lessons were going well. She liked being out on the slopes in the crisp air and forgetting about everything except learning this new sport.
But as she slid the hangers along the rod, opened drawers and started putting pieces together, the hollow in the center of her body began to grow, inching its way into her veins, pushing her blood aside to make room for the empty tentacles stretching toward her heart with a cold efficiency that promised loneliness would soon own her. She dropped the ski clothes into a bright-colored heap on the floor, dressed in jeans and hiking boots instead, called the desk for a vehicle and walked into the living room of the suite.
Sunlight coming in through the windows lay in stripes on the floor. In the air, dust motes danced in them, held up, probably, by the raw electricity running through every nerve in her body. Brock liked to be in control and he didn’t like surprises.
She was past caring what Brock liked. That was new. She hadn’t known that before.
“I’ll be busy all day,” he said without looking up from his Blackberry phone.
“No problem,” she said. “I’ll be gone.”
He glanced at her. Just long enough to see what she was wearing. “You’re not skiing?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I want to go driving.”
This unusual stroke of independence made him actually look at her this time. He narrowed his eyes as if this was the most irritating thing she could possibly have said to him.
“I should’ve had enough sense not to bring you to a resort with no town,” he said in the tone he liked to use with her. The tone that implied You idiot child. “Gotta be spending my money or you don’t know what to do with yourself.”
She ignored that and walked past him to find her parka and bag.
“Hold on ‘til I talk to a couple of people and then I’ll call Jim to fly you down to Jackson Hole. You can shop all day.”
“Jackson is the town,” she said. “Jackson Hole is the valley.”
She slid her arms into the sleeves of the parka.
He actually dropped the phone and stood up.
“What th’ hell is the matter with you? You can’t go running around by yourself in a place you’ve never been. That’s some wild country out there. This is insane. This isn’t like you, Clea.”
It sure as hell isn’t. But maybe I’m changing.
She didn’t have the guts to go quite as far as to say that out loud, but she’d already gotten his attention. He was staring, no, glaring, at her. All she wanted was to be away from him.
“I don’t have time for this,” he snapped. “Have you lost your mind?”
She’d love to blurt out the truth of her feelings right then but even as she thought about it she knew she didn’t have the nerve. He would go ballistic.
And actually, until she had a chance to think, she didn’t know exactly what she did feel or want. So as usual, she took the easy way.
“Look,” she lied, “I saw an ad. I just want to go look at a horse.” Brock relaxed. This was something familiar. This was something he could control.
“Well, why didn’t you say so? When have I ever denied you a horse?” He sat down and began dialing the phone again. “Just remember not to use your whole fifteen K for the down payment or the rest of your nags won’t eat. I’m not putting another red cent in that account until next month.”
Halfway to the elevator, she knew she couldn’t—wouldn’t—tell lies forever to preserve the accustomed parameters of their so-called marriage. It was a bargained deal that she’d let her daddy make for her.
She’d thought she loved Brock, though. Or maybe she’d just told herself that because she wanted to please Daddy.
She was nothing but Brock’s arm ornament and his ticket into some social circles, plus his business alliances with her father. He disdained her really or he wouldn’t use that tone with her.
And why shouldn’t he? She kept her mouth shut and did as she was told and in return he bought her anything she wanted and gave her plenty of money to support her horse habit. To him, she was only as good as her manicure.
Only as good as her last social performance. Like a rodeo cowboy who was only as good as his last ride.
Clea was barely out of sight of the resort when she began to really see. The mountains and the sky, cobalt and white meeting in sharp, clean edges. Gray gravel coming through the dirty scraped snow in front of the car. One tan deer bounding across the road into green trees that were as deep as a vertical dream. Yellow sun so bright it made her smile.
This world so huge and wild it filled her heart.
She smiled to herself. Right now, that day with Brock seemed a hundred years ago. Now here she was in Montana again and she was in the middle of the end. It wouldn’t be the end of the end with Brock until somehow he accepted the fact that Ariel belonged to her. Rightfully. Morally.
But when had Brock ever cared about right and wrong?
She took a deep breath and pushed the past and future from her mind. She let the land and the sky take her again. Then she realized she was getting close to her destination. She should begin to look for the sign where she would turn in on her road. There was one, wasn’t there? According to the realtor, there was.
Holding the wheel with one hand, she fished deep into her new chocolate-brown Gucci bag to find the map the man had faxed to her, then slowed while she looked at it. Yes. The sign would be on her right and it read Firecreek Mountain Road.
After two nights, each with no more than four or five hours of nervous dozing in the living quarters of the trailer—which she could never have done without the alarm system and the gun she’d bought when she took the course in home protec-tion—she’d gone right on through exhaustion and come out the other side. A sharp edge of excitement—and quite a bit of fear also, to be totally honest—had wound her up tight.
This was her new world, the one where she would become another person. She could only pray she was strong enough to do that.
These snow-topped mountains, this endless sky, that narrow road that wound up and up, following Fire Creek to its source, as the man had described it, they all were hers now. And she’d be theirs. She’d belong to them and to the log cabin and barn he’d told her were at the top of the first high ridge.
She would not belong to any people.
She drove more and more slowly, looking for the sign, determined not to miss it because if she passed it she’d be forced to find a good place to turn the trailer around. Just the thought of having to drive even one unnecessary mile was more than she could bear. Ariel needed to get out of the trailer. She’d been exercised at both nights’ roadside rest stops, but that wasn’t nearly enough.
A bed would be wonderful, but later. Right now, a shower and something homemade to eat, even if it was only a scrambled egg and toast.
If the realtor had brought in the food and supplies that she’d ordered.
Come to think of it, she hadn’t even checked on the cost for that service. She shouldn’t have asked for it at all. If she wanted to live for at least a year on the money she had, she had to learn to think differently. From now on she had to do everything for herself, including clean her own house. She had to make every penny count.
And every brain cell. Brock would be beside himself by now and he’d be looking for her. That was a given. She’d slept in the trailer to keep from leaving a trail at horse hotels or horse people’s places, so she had to make that sacrifice count, too. She’d ordered a new cell phone no one knew about. She’d brought hair dye—Sassy Black—to cover Ari’s white markings. Perhaps she should use it before anybody here saw the mare.
There it was. The sign, Firecreek Mountain Road.
And another one, fancier, that read, Wild Horses.
Right. The realtor was all excited about the wild horse sanctuary. He said that sometimes tourists could see bands of them and sometimes they couldn’t, but they could always buy T-shirts and mugs and photographs with photos of wild horses on them and spend the night at the local motels and eat at the cafés in the little town of Pine Lodge.
She only hoped she could get close enough to shoot some pictures of the wild horses for herself. But if they wouldn’t cooperate, she could understand—at the moment, she needed her own space with a longing that went to the bone.
However, it’d be something fun to try, a challenge. Taking pictures was her other comfort, besides horses. It soothed her somehow. After her mother died, it had made her feel secure, as if whatever subject she captured would be hers to hold in her hand forever.
Which made no sense at all, since during that time she’d clung to every picture of her mother she could find, yet her mother was irrevocably gone.
That was before she’d learned that nothing is forever.
She should’ve already known.
She took the turn carefully, mindful of the way the trailer was tracking because the gravel road wasn’t very wide and the last thing she needed right now was to hang a wheel off the end of the tin horn. Once she’d straightened out the rig and headed up the first rise on the winding road into the hills, Clea let herself believe it. She was here.
And Ariel was here.
Feeling even more efficient, Clea looked at her odometer so she could measure the last leg of the journey and turn in at the correct driveway.
Then she rolled down her window so she could smell this place. Sage, she knew that smell, and a hint of pine but the dry air carried other scents, too. It was such dry air and thinner than she was used to. A whole new world from the ground up.
A chuckle began deep inside, rolled up into her throat and came out as a short but sincere belly laugh.
“Hey, Brock,” she said into the enormous space that surrounded her. “Catch me if you can.”
She’d told him once or twice that she would love to live—which was true—in northern New Mexico. Live in an artists’ colony and do nothing but take pictures in that fabulous light, she had said. He might look for her there.
Or not. Half the time, he didn’t listen to a word she said.
She glanced to her left, down into the valley along the river that flashed in and out behind some trees. There was a small ranch house and barn and some other outbuildings. Who lived there? Would she ever meet them?
How far was it on up to her place? She looked at the faxed map again and checked her mileage one more time. Not far.
Here was another hill, another ridge that led on up toward the big mountains with their striped bluffs and trees with snow still on their tops. The first high ridge. That had to be it.
Clea was going into the next switchback when she saw him. She’d turned away from the glare of sunlight off the rearview mirror and there he was, an arm’s length inside the fence, riding down the slope on the right-hand side of the road.
Coming out of the trees like a cowboy in a Russell painting, his blue shirt like sky against the green. Exactly like that.
Her heart lurched. Exactly like that, with a name like Saving the Baby or Mama’s Gone. He carried a small bright sorrel foal in front of his saddle; its long legs dangled off the sides of the big gray horse.
She couldn’t take her eyes off him—something about the sure way he sat the horse, something about the easy way his left hand held the reins and his right one rested on the baby he was rescuing. He had a presence.
Without taking her eyes from him, she slowed the rig still more and grabbed her camera from the slot in the console where she always carried it. Slipping it from the case, she raised it to her eye as she slowed even more.
The rider was looking at the foal. His hat was tilted down, but just as she passed him by he lifted his head and swept his gaze across her rig. She took the shot. Broad shoulders, a lock of black hair on his forehead, a blaze of green eyes imprinted on her mind’s eye. Then she was moving again, on around the curve.
It was one of the best photos she’d ever taken. She knew it in her gut. She knew it because she could feel that a huge smile was splitting her face and she was bubbling deep inside. What a moment! What a shot! And she’d been ready!
This had to be a good omen for her new life.
She would name it Montana Cowboy.
The sight of him haunted her as she finished the short drive to the ranch entrance that matched the X on her map. Even as she turned in under the swinging hand-carved wooden sign that read Elkhorn Ranch and started looking for her cabin, she could still see the whole gorgeous scene of the cowboy and the bright foal.
The epitome of cowboy gallantry—rescuing a creature weaker than himself. Sacrificing his time and effort to make sure that this baby would be all right instead of rounding up cattle or fixing fences or breaking colts or whatever other jobs he had to do.
She spotted the cabin sitting up a long driveway in a little meadow with blazing yellow and red leaves on the trees at its back. Fall was a fantastic time of year and one that at home often was either way too short or non-existent. She was going to enjoy this one to the fullest. She was going to love it here.
Clea parked and got out, then reached into the backseat for her jean jacket. The fall wind in Montana carried a bite of coolness that would be months yet reaching Texas.
She checked on Ariel, then left her standing in the trailer while she ran through the grass to check out the barn and the pen around it. Her lungs grabbed for more of the thin, dry air that roused her blood. This was exciting. She didn’t want to sleep after all.
The barn door stood open.
Inside, she stopped short and breathed in the smell—like that of any barn but with an overlay of age and seasoned wood. Cedar. Her eyes tried to take it all in at once. It had been built of cedar logs a long, long time ago and it had been well used. It was clean; a little neglected but not bad. The realtor had assured her everything was clean.
She smiled. Talk about different! This barn was as different from any she’d ever used as Ariel was from the horses Clea imagined had lived here before. She loved its atmo-sphere—all rustic and rough and built to be serviceable. Everything useful; nothing fancy just for show.
Somebody had left some grooming brushes and buckets in the little feed room, but she had her own, of course. Same with the feed in the barrel and the hay. They looked and smelled pretty fresh, so the former tenant must’ve just moved out.
The water tank in the pen was nearly full, too. She unloaded the mare and led her around the perimeters to let her get acclimated, then left her delirious with freedom to run around inside the pen. Clea went to the back door of the house and to her shock found it unlocked. It swung open into a kitchen with the same look as the barn: functional, rustic and actually—no doubt unintentionally—charming. The furniture was the really rough kind made of logs but there was an old blanket-covered couch in the living room that looked soft and comfortable. She loved that there was a fireplace in the wall that opened to both rooms.
The basic pots, pans and dishes were in the kitchen as promised, but the supplies weren’t at all what Clea had ordered. Right then, she didn’t even care. She’d go to town tomorrow. And she’d be sure to pay only for what she got and not what she ordered when she went by the realtor’s office.
