Military Romance Collection: Contemporary Soldier Alpha Male Romance (23 page)

4

              Freddie took Matthew to the side before the hunt began. “Listen,” he said. “I don’t mean any disrespect, all right?”

              Matthew cocked his head. “We’re good.”

              “Well,” Freddie said, “I know you don’t know how to shoot a gun, and you know you don’t know how to shoot a gun.” He shrugged. “But your brother is touchy about some shit. And if I bring you up on this hunt unarmed, he’s going to take it that I’m giving you a vote of no confidence.”

              Matthew laughed. “That would be a smart vote!”

              Freddie grinned. “All right.All right. I see we understand each other. But I don’t want to give your brother nothing to beef about.” He handed Matthew a rifle. “This is the dangerous end. If you need to use this, make sure it’s not pointed at you, and it’s not pointed at me. You got it?”

              Matthew nodded.

              “Here’s how you take the safety off. Here’s the trigger.” Freddie looked at Matthew intently. “You’ve got five shells in there. It’s not going to bother me a bit to take this gun back with five shells still in it, all right?”

              Matthew felt a tremendous surge of relief. “All right.” He slipped the rifle into his horse’s saddle holster. “I won’t take it out unless I absolutely have to.”

              “You won’t absolutely have to,” Freddie said. “If a coyote gets away, he gets away. I want to make sure I’m still around to hunt for him tomorrow.” He stepped up into the stirrup and in one smooth motion mounted his horse. “Right now, with that gun, not knowing what you’re doing, you’re way more dangerous to me than the coyotes. When we’ve got time, we can work on changing that, if you’re planning on staying around.”

              “What do you think about that?” Matthew asked. He wasn’t nearly as graceful as Freddie was at getting into the saddle, but he managed.

              “About you staying around?”

              Matthew nodded.

              “When I met your brother,” Freddie said, “He didn’t know much about ranching. Your uncle died and left this place with the intention that you and your brothers were going to sell it.”

              “That was the plan,” Matthew agreed. He remembered how surprised he had been when Charlie announced he wasn’t going to return to the world of high tech, opting instead for a career raising rough stock. “None of us knew anything about ranching.”

              “But your brother wanted to learn,” Freddie said. “I’ve never seen a man work so hard at learning something in my whole life. He’s brought Wyatt Roderiguez out here coaching him. He’s always reading up on things. He’ll come to me or Sean when he don’t know what to do.”

              “When Charlie wants something, he goes all in,” Matthew said. “That’s how he’s always been.”

              “But you don’t want this,” Freddie said. “Your eyes don’t light up when you’re looking at the herd. You’re not excited when a new foal comes -  not in the same way.”

              Matthew shrugged. “I guess not.”

              “It’s not your place, I get that,” Freddie said. “But some people love this life, and some people don’t. I don’t think it’s your thing, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Different strokes for different folks.”  The trail opened up before them, going up a steep grade. Freddie leaned forward in the saddle as they ascended. “But it’s a hard life if you don’t love it.”

              “I’m beginning to see that,” Matthew agreed. “Those coyotes could have really hurt me last night.”

              “Oh, they could have killed you,” Freddie said cheerfully. “They took a guy out on the other side of Rita Loma not two weeks ago.”

              Matthew looked at Freddie, shocked. “What?”

              “If you have to use that rifle, use it,” Freddie said. “I’m not about to tell your brother your sorry ass got chewed up.”

              “I wondered why you loaded it,” Matthew said. “Charlie didn’t need to know there were no bullets in the gun.”

              “Coyotes are dangerous,” Freddie said. “But they’re animals. At the end of the day, as long as we’re aware and careful, everything should be fine.”

              There was a strange buzzing sound in the air, cutting through the early dawn light like a saw blade.  “What’s that?” Matthew said.

              “It means we’re almost there,” Freddie said. “We’ll want to be on the quiet side.” He got out his phone and sent a quick text message, smiling when he got a reply. “Sean said they’re all set down below.” He looked at Matthew. “You ready?”

              “As ready as I’m going to be.”

              “Then let’s go!” Freddie put the spurs to his horse and sped ahead, setting gravel and dust flying.  Matthew took a deep breath and did the same thing, following as closely as he could.

              There were eight coyotes gathered around Lady Lou’s carcass. Two of them took off immediately at the sound of the approaching horses. Two had been eating and were reluctant to abandon their meal; Freddie dispatched them with a couple of quick shots.

              The remaining four coyotes began to run. Matthew concentrated on chasing them down the trail toward where his brother was waiting with Sean. It was amazing how quickly the khaki-colored creatures could move. They ran with a fluid grace, leaping over obstacles effortlessly. Each coyote kept its pack mates in sight; as they ran, they’d get so close their fur was almost touching.

              It was a tendency Freddie used against them. Riding at near full speed, the ranch hand had the rifle balanced expertly. He fired off a shot that went through one coyote and into the body of the one next to it. The first coyote fell instantly, the second continued running with a ribbon of blood flowing from its side.

              They pursued the trio of fleeing coyotes until Freddie pulled up abruptly, holding up his hand to signal that Matthew should also stop. “We don’t want to get ourselves shot,” he explained. A split second later, a rifle shot cracked out, followed by a third, fourth, and fifth. “That’s probably your brother.”  A moment passed, and there was a huge boom that echoed off the hillside. “And that’s Sean, with that pea shooter he calls a gun.”

              The horses were breathing heavy. Matthew patted the side of his mount’s neck. “That was an exciting day, wasn’t it? You probably thought you were going to sit around eating grain all day.”

              Freddie laughed. “It does them good to do some honest work for a change.” His phone buzzed, and he pulled it out of his pocket. “Sean says they got two of them,” he read. “We might as well ride down and take a look.”

              Charlie was standing over the carcass of a coyote, looking like a man who’d conquered the world. “We did it!” he announced to Matthew, as soon as they arrived. “These bastards won’t be bothering my herd!”

              Matthew smiled. He saw that the coyote his brother had killed was the one Freddie had wounded, but didn’t mention it. “You’re a way better shot than I am!”

              Charlie beamed. “You should see Sean shoot,” he said, nodding toward where the other cowboy corpse lay slumped on the ground. “He got that one mid-air.”

              “The other one got away,” Sean said. He was speaking to everyone, but his attention was on Freddie. “How did it go up top?”

              “We lost two right from the get-go,” Freddie said.

              “So there are three left,” Sean replied.

              Matthew had the sense that the coyote hunt hadn’t been nearly as successful as either of the ranch hands had hoped, but knew neither man was about to mention that in front of his brother. “Let’s go down and let Ada know everything turned out all right,” he suggested. “I know she’s worried.”

              Charlie looked at the position of the sun in the sky and nodded. “You’re right.” He turned toward Freddie and Sean. “Is it all right if we head down now, or do you guys need us up here with you?”

              Freddie shook his head. “Sean and I are going to deal with these carcasses,” he said, “and that’s nasty work. You don’t want to have to deal with that.” He smiled. “But if you want to tell Ada to fry up a little bit more of that bacon for some BLTs when we get back down there later on, that’d be all right.”

              Charlie beamed. “She is a good cook, isn’t she?” He swung up in his saddle and beckoned to Matthew. “We’ll go tell her.”

              In the short time it took to ride back to the ranch, Matthew heard his younger brother explain exactly what it had been like to dispatch the coyote at least three times.

              “They were smaller than I expected,” he said. “From the way you and Freddie were carrying on, I expected them to be real big beasts, but they were really kind of on the scrawny side.”

              “They’re bigger when you’re on foot,” Matthew said. It was a comment his brother dismissed with a wave of his gloved hand.

              “They’re definitely fast. And they can jump like anything.” The coyote Sean had shot had been leaping over a good sized boulder at the time; if the obstacle hadn’t of been there, they would have four coyotes to track down instead of three. “It was a pure lucky shot that Sean had – that was a one-in-a-million kind of thing.”

              “The more you practice, the more luck you have,” Matthew said. He felt his brother glance at him, but diverted the conversation by saying, “Hey, who’s truck is that in your yard?”

              The last time Matthew had asked that question, the answer had been the very dangerous Big Jesus, determined to exact revenge on Charlie. This time, however, the visitor was far more welcome.

              “It’s David!” Charlie exclaimed, with joy in his voice. “He told me he’d have a red Silverado!” He gave his horse a none-too-gentle nudge in the ribs and started to ride quickly toward the house. “Come on! Let’s go!”

              Matthew gave his horse a gentle kick. It didn’t bother him to let Charlie speed on ahead. For one, he wasn’t half of the horseman his brother was. He didn’t want to go faster than he could handle and wind up plunging out of the saddle. Second, this was Charlie’s ranch. It was probably wise, given his brother’s increasingly touchy temper, to let him arrive first.

5

              David had brought not one but two surprises to his brother’s Texas ranch.

              “Everyone, this is Saba.” Saba was a very short, dark haired woman with wide eyes and a shy smile. She had a red scarf over her black hair, and wore an outfit that kept most of her body covered up. “And this is our son, Hafez.”

              Ada squealed with joy. “He is so beautiful!” she exclaimed to Saba. “May I hold him?”

              “Yes, of course,” Saba said. She lay her son gently in Ada’s arms. “I see that soon you too with be my sister in motherhood.”

              Ada nodded. “Any day now.”

              “Our sons shall grow to be strong together,” Saba said. “Here in America is a good place to raise children.”

              Charlie glanced at his brother. “That’s quite a bit of news to keep to yourself.”

              David nodded. “The Army’s got some stupid regulations about marrying civilians. You wouldn’t believe the hoops we had to jump through. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to bring Saba home with me, and if I couldn’t?” He shrugged. “I would have had to stay over there to make sure they were safe.”

              “I’m glad it all worked out,” Ada said, enthusiastically. “Do you like tea? I’ve just made a big pitcher of sweet tea. You must be parched.”

              Saba nodded. “That sounds lovely.” The two women departed into the house, chattering like they’d known each other forever.

              “Well, that didn’t take long,” David said.

              “Ada’s great,” Charlie said. “She’s got that Southern hospitality thing down pat.” His smile was broad. “By the time we get in there, she’ll know everything about Saba’s family…”

              “That won’t take long,” David replied. “They’re all dead.”

              Charlie and Matthew looked at him, shocked.

              “It’s a war over there,” David said. There was an edge to his voice that Matthew had never heard before, not even during the many phone conversations they’d had during David’s deployment, times when his unit had taken some serious casualties. “You guys don’t even know.”

              “Was it the Taliban?” Matthew asked.

              David shook his head. “It was us. Some chickenshit asshole who didn’t know his ass from his elbow called in air support all wrong. The coordinates he gave were about as wrong as they could be. Saba’s village was wiped out. Her husband and older son were killed right in front of her.”

              “Jesus,” Charlie said. He reached out and put his hand on David’s shoulder. “That is fucked up.”

              “Shit happens,” David said. “That’s what she would tell you.”

              “That shit ain’t right though,” Matthew said. The pain his younger brother was in was clear to him. “We’ll do our best to make her welcome here.”

              David smiled. “That’s kind of you bro, but we won’t be staying all that long. Texas is too hot right now. We’re going to be looking for somewhere a little cooler.”

              “I thought it got hot in Afghanistan,” Charlie said.

              “Nope. They get snow,” David said, looking out over the horizon. “More than you might think.”

              Ada took Matthew to the side that afternoon. “I’m going to do a special dinner. I mean, it was going to be good anyway, but now that Saba and Hafez are here, I want it to be even better. Did you want to give Jenn a call so she can come out and meet everyone?”

              Matthew blinked at her. Calling Jenn hadn’t crossed his mind once, not even to relay the news of the morning’s coyote hunt. “Do you think I should?”

              Ada looked at him intently, studying her brother in law’s expression for a long moment. “Well, do you want to see her?”

              Matthew shrugged. “I guess.”

              “Matthew.” There was a firm note in Ada’s tone; it surprised him. She spoke so gently most times. “Jenn deserves more than I guess. If you’re not into her, that’s fine, but let her go. Don’t keep her hanging on the line with I guess.”

              “It shows, huh?”

              “It’s been showing.” Ada smiled. “Charlie thinks the sun rises and sets on her shoulders, because she knows just about everything there is to know about horses.” She shrugged her shoulders. “But that isn’t going to make her be the right woman for you.”

              Saba walked by the window, holding baby Hafez in her arms. “I never expected David to come home with a wife like that,” Matthew said.

              “I don’t think any of us did, but it’s a thing that happens a lot,” Ada replied. “When you spend five, six years of your life in a foreign country, you’re going to look around and get to know the people. Love happens.”

              “But it takes time,” Matthew said. “And Jenn’s not a person who takes her time.”

              Ada flattened her hand over her stomach. “She has her reasons.”

              “What’s that supposed to mean?” Matthew asked. A thought struck him as he remembered the encounter the two of them had had at the rodeo. “Don’t tell me she’s pregnant.”

              “Oh, no!” Ada shook her head. “Jenn’s not like that. But she does want to have a family, sooner rather than later.”

              Matthew sat down. “I’m not ready for that. I’m not ready at all for that.” He shook his head. “For God’s sake. I just got out of jail. My life is in shambles. I haven’t even begun to figure out what I’m going to do to get things back on track. There couldn’t be a worse possible time to think about having kids.”  The magnitude of what Jenn was looking for was overwhelming.

              “I don’t think you should call her,” Ada said, nodding her head and turning back toward the kitchen. “Not for tonight, if there’s no sense in it. But I do think you should talk to her.”