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“Catalina works there tonight. Maybe she’ll enter the contest.” The sly way Dusty spoke made Reed glance up.
Was Dusty goading Jesse? Did Jesse have a thing for the pretty young woman he’d seen waiting tables at Leon’s?
Jesse’s hands paused on the upswing with the posthole digger. “Catalina won’t enter.” He rammed the diggers into the hole with more force than he’d been using.
“I bet she will. She’d do almost anything for money. Won’t she? That Catalina is a wild one.” Dusty shot a glance at Jesse. “Wouldn’t mind doing the tango with that little chili pepper.”
The young Hispanic’s face turned a mottled red. “Shut up.”
“She’s one fine-looking woman.”
“Leave her alone.” Jesse left the digger in the hole and stalked across the dirt toward Dusty.
A good four inches taller and with twice the bulk as the lean and trim Jesse, Dusty hiked his sleeves up his arms, not a shred of fear in his cocky expression.
“She’s better than you.”
“She’s no better than any of you Mexicans. Except she’s a lot prettier. If I want her, I’ll take her and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”
Red flushed beneath the dark tan of Jesse’s skin right before he swung. His fist skimmed past Dusty’s jaw as the other man deftly ducked to the left and swung a right hook into Jesse’s midsection.
Chewy leaped into the fray, tearing at Dusty’s arm, growling like a rabid wolf.
“Damn dog. I’ll kill the son of a—” Dusty swung his arm, pushing the dog out and away from him, the animal slamming against a fence post.
Reed dropped the post he’d been working and grabbed Jesse by the back of the shirt, jerking him out of the path of the bigger man’s next uppercut. “Cool it, Dusty.”
Chewy staggered to all four feet and shook out his coat before stalking toward Reed now, growling deep in his throat, his gaze sweeping from Dusty to Reed.
Reed nodded toward the animal. “Call off the dog, Jesse.”
For a moment Jesse hesitated, then he said in a stern tone, “Down, Chewy.”
“Need a bodyguard, Jesse?” Dusty taunted.
“Get out of the way, Bryson.” Jesse’s voice was low and threatening. “This is between me and the jerk.”
“It’s over. We have work to do.” Reed stood between the two.
Finally, Dusty shrugged and lifted another T-post from the ground at his feet. “Don’t know why you get all upset over her. Cat’s not all that great. She’s got too much attitude for her own good.”
“She’s got more class in her little finger than you have in your entire body.”
“Never said I had class, maybe that’s why I like hanging out with her.”
“Knock it off.” Reed waited a full minute until Jesse went back to work digging his hole and Chewy followed him. The dog planted himself next to the man, his black-eyed gaze following Dusty’s every move.
Once Dusty and Jesse seemed in control, Reed went back to the post he’d been working. He kicked dirt into the hole to pack the post in, wishing he could kick a little sense and manners into Dusty. The man was trouble. Why Mona kept him on, he didn’t know. Something smooth and black buried in the dust caught the sunlight and glared into Reed’s eyes. When he leaned over and brushed aside the dust, he found a square matchbook with white letters spelling out Leon’s Bar.
Dusty tossed the pole pounder beside Reed’s feet.
Anger bubbled up inside Reed at Dusty’s carelessness. The pole pounder wasn’t something you tossed close to others. If Reed had moved an inch or two, Dusty could have hit him in the head. The blow from the heavy steel could have killed him or rendered him unconscious with a caved-in skull.
“Find something?” Dusty asked.
Reed’s instinct where Dusty was concerned was one of gut-level distrust. He closed his fist around the matchbook and straightened, shooting a glare from the pole pounder to Dusty. “No, I didn’t find a thing. Did you?” He moved away from the man, pocketing the matchbook and tucking away a mental note to check out the story on Dusty Gaither.
Chapter Five
Exhausted and dispirited, Mona pulled up in front of the ranch house and shifted into park. All she wanted to do was stand in the shower for twenty minutes and fall into bed. Two hours of sleep the previous night wasn’t enough for a pregnant woman.
At five and a half months, she was just beginning to understand her limitations. She hated that she didn’t bounce back the way she had before she got pregnant.
Not until she climbed down from the truck did she notice a distinct lack of vehicles around the house and bunkhouse. The only truck was Fernando’s lovingly cared for, baby-blue 1967 Chevy pickup.
Before her foot touched the bottom step leading to the porch, Fernando rounded the back of the house. “Miss Mona, you’re back.”
“I am.”
“Any luck with the banks in Amarillo?”
“Not yet. Two agreed to take the application to their underwriters. They’ll get back to me sometime next week.” She tugged the ponytail loose at the back of her head and shook out her hair. “Where is everyone? Out pulling guard duty?”
“No. We brought the cows in to one of the closer pastures for the night. It was Dusty’s night off. Which wasn’t a problem until Jesse disappeared after supper. I’d guess they’re both headed for Prairie Rock.”
“What about the new guy?” Mona avoided Fernando’s gaze and saying Reed’s name out loud, as though saying it made it more of an intimate question. She sighed. Her sleep-deprived brain was making her loopy. If she wasn’t careful, she’d start thinking irrationally and more like a schoolgirl with a crush instead of a savvy landowner. A savvy landowner whose back and feet were killing her.
“Señor Bryson went to town as well.”
Mona’s head jerked up. “He did?”
“Sí.” Fernando crossed his arms over his chest. “I insisted. Since he needed to stop by and visit his familia I asked him to go on to Leon’s to keep an eye on Dusty and Jesse.”
Add a pain in the neck to her list of aching body parts. “So Dusty’s been pushing Jesse again?”
“I only caught the end of their argument earlier. I believe it had something to do with my hija.”
“Dios!” Mona plunked her straw hat back on her head and, ignoring every aching bone in her body and the gnawing hunger in her belly, she marched down the steps and climbed into her truck.
“Miss Mona, Señor Bryson can handle them. My esposa has dinner waiting for you. You must think about the bebé.”
“I’ll grab something at Leon’s.” Mona slammed the door and revved the engine, cutting off Fernando’s protests.
Of all the pigheaded male posturing. Dusty couldn’t let it go. He knew Jesse was in love with Catalina and she wanted nothing to do with him. Why did he insist on rubbing it in? Too often, his taunting ended in fistfights. Most often when they were at Leon’s with Dusty all liquored up.
Darkness cloaked the plains. The scent of dry prairie grass blasted into the open windows of the pickup. The wind helped to keep Mona awake on the thirty-minute drive into Prairie Rock. That and a full-blown, in-your-face desire to slap someone upside the head helped to keep her adrenaline flowing and her eyes open to watch for critters crossing the empty highway.
If she could have fired Dusty, she would have. She couldn’t afford to pay her hands much and Dusty hadn’t seemed to mind the pittance she could offer him. Reed as well. Until Reed showed up, she thought she’d have to spend the last trimester of her pregnancy on night-watch duty.
Still, she considered letting Dusty go. His redneck attitude had caused more problems than he was worth. Hell, if the bank foreclosed, she’d have to let them all go.
A brick wall of depression played havoc with her emotions and she sniffed several times before she grit her teeth and pressed harder on the gas pedal. She’d be damned if she gave in to her very own pity party.
SITTING IN THE WINDOW overlooking her tiny rose garden, Grace Bryson smiled at her son. The left side of her face didn’t respond, but the light in her eyes said it all. “I’m so happy you came to see me. Today, I walked in my garden for fifteen minutes.”
Fifteen minutes. This from a woman who’d walked miles of ranchland tending the animals and working alongside her husband to make the spread work for them. Her words were halting and slurred, but she forced them out, like a climber determined to reach the top of a mountain.
As he took his mother’s hand, a lump the size of a wadded sock lodged in Reed’s throat. “That’s great, Mom.”
Her fingers curled loosely around his and she gave him a gentle squeeze. “Have you tried talking to your father?”
Reed bent close to hear her words, the slur in her speech making her difficult to understand. She’d come a long way in her recovery from the stroke over the past six months, but the doctor said she might never fully recover her speech.
Reed would take whatever he could get. This woman raised him and loved him unconditionally when his father had shown him little patience or understanding. Why should he talk to his father? They hadn’t had anything to say to each other since he’d turned eighteen and left home. “No, I haven’t spoken to him.”
“He wants to talk to you.”
If he’d been so anxious to talk to him, why had he left as soon as Reed arrived? “I’ll catch him later. It’s getting dark, do you want the light on?”
“Yes, thank you.”
He reached above her and tugged the chain for the floor lamp beside her chair.
His mother leaned back against the headrest. “You don’t have to wait here with me. William will be back soon. I could stand a little time alone.” She chuckled. “I like to take little naps now and then so that I can stay awake through my television shows.”
Reed smiled. “Okay. If you’re sure you’ll be all right.”
“I will. Don’t forget to talk to your father. He’s been meaning to speak with you since you came back. He just doesn’t know how.”
No kidding. Reed’s lips tightened. The only way he’d ever talked to Reed was to tell him everything he was doing wrong. Never a word of encouragement or love.
“Give him a chance. It’s not all his fault the way he acted when you were young. If it’s anyone’s fault, blame me.”
He leaned across and kissed her wrinkled forehead. “I couldn’t fault you for anything. You were always there for me.”
Her grip tightened on his hand and she held him close. “I made mistakes, Reed. Unfortunately, you paid for them.”
“I don’t understand.”
She closed her eyes. “Talk to William. He promised to explain for me.” Her grip loosened until her hand dropped from his onto the arm of the lounge chair.
For a long moment, Reed listened for the sound of her breathing. Until he heard her long shallow breaths he didn’t breathe himself. Grace Bryson was asleep.
After covering her with a light blanket and tipping the chair to a full recline, he let himself out of the house, locking the door behind him.
He felt strange leaving her alone, but she’d insisted she would be all right. Six months into his mother’s recovery, Reed still worried about her. What if she had another stroke?
Darkness had settled in over the town of Prairie Rock. From a distance, he could hear loud country-western music booming into the star-filled night sky. That would be his next stop for the evening. Leon’s Bar.
Fernando had insisted he should go to town and play babysitter to the two young hotheads who’d been ready to tear each other’s throats out all day. Once off the ranch, with no one to hold them back, they’d probably succeed. Part of Reed was ready to let them go at it. The other part knew Jesse was no match for the much larger and meaner Dusty, and having two of them out of commission would only add more stress. Mona needed ranch hands who could work long, hard days, not men with broken bones, laid up for the next six to eight weeks.
Reed ran a hand down his face. Being up all night had left him tired and cranky. He was used to pulling all-nighters, but they got harder the older he got.
With a sigh, he climbed into his truck and turned toward the bar. He had another reason to come to Leon’s Bar—to track a rustler.
When he pulled in front of the ramshackle building made of heavy timbers and corrugated-tin siding, he noted the dozen trucks and cars lining the parking lot. With the band playing a lively tune, the night was just getting started.
Careful not to appear too obvious, he walked in front of the heavy-duty trucks looking for signs of damage from pushing through wooden fence posts. The trucks sporting heavy front grilles all looked as if they’d been driven hard over rough terrain. Any one of them could have done the damage.
At the door, Reed paid the cover charge to a burly man wearing a black cowboy hat and stepped into the smoky tavern. Scantily clad waitresses, wearing shorts no mother should let her daughter out of the house in, sashayed between the tables and bar, filling orders and swatting straying hands.
He spotted Catalina at the bar talking to one of the local ranchers, a tray balanced on one pretty, rounded hip. He could see why Jesse and Dusty were fighting over her.
Her long, blond hair reached down to the middle of her back and her smile and laugh had every red-blooded man in the room turning her way.
Dusty sat at the bar, dressed in clean, pressed jeans and a fancy western shirt with shiny pearl buttons, a sure sign he was on the prowl for a little female company. He shouted for another round of whiskey, his voice loud enough to be heard all the way to the courthouse on Main Street. Definitely loud enough to be heard over the band.
So far, Jesse hadn’t made an appearance. Maybe Reed was in luck and he wouldn’t have to break up another fight today. One had been enough and he wanted to take the time to people watch. If their black-haired rustler showed up with a cut on his head, he was going to nail him to the nearest post.
Choosing a table as far away from the speakers as possible, Reed sank into a seat in a dark corner, the bass woofer pounding against the inside of his head, even from this distance.
Thankfully, after five more minutes of eardrum-splitting tunes, the band took its first break and the jukebox took over in much lower decibels.
More people drifted in as the hour neared ten. So far Reed hadn’t found a dark-haired man with a cut on his head. Then again, most men wore cowboy hats. At least half a dozen had black hair, some long, some short. Reed ruled out the short hair. The length he’d seen on the barb had been at least two inches and straight. Which ruled out the buzz-cut young cowboys two-stepping around the wooden dance floor.
Several Hispanic men crowded around a table at the opposite end of the bar from Reed, all guzzling beer and watching the dancers and other bar patrons.
At least three of the five had longish straight black hair. One had gray hair and the other had his hair cut in a short buzz. Of the three with long hair, two wore cowboy hats.
How to get them out of their hats. Reed bided his time.
“Can I get you another beer?” Catalina Garcia leaned over the empty table next to him and lifted empty bottles onto her tray, a healthy amount of cleavage on display.
“No, thanks.” He’d been nursing the same beer since he arrived. It had gone flat and warm, but he wasn’t there to drink.
“Mona tells me she hired you out at her place.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Mona’s a really nice girl,” she said as if commenting on the weather, while she wiped the table with a wet washrag. When she was done, she turned to him. “Don’t do anything to hurt her, will you? She’s got enough going on in her life.”
“She hired me to help her, not hurt her.” Reed’s brows drew together. “What exactly do you mean?”
The serious look she’d just given him changed into a twisted smile. “You’re not exactly hard to look at, you know.” With that she flounced away, her bottom twitching back and forth like an open invitation.
An invitation Reed wasn’t accepting. Nor was he interested in Mona as anything other than his boss. The end.
“Mind if I join you?”
