Run Away Home (11 page)

The cattle were thirsty, but they were ready to bolt if she did something else scary.

Used to Sam's voice, Buddy crowded past the others and lowered her curly white head to drink.

Sam didn't say another word, because she didn't want to spook the rest of the animals, but she grinned when Buddy stopped drinking and raised her head to stare at her.

Yeah, it's me,
Sam thought as her breath and the heifer's combined in a mist between them.

Buddy's white eyelashes blinked. Then she tossed her slick pink nose, gave a storybook “moo,” and kept drinking. To Sam, it meant “hi,” but the rest of the cattle took the sound as a signal that Sam was harmless.

As Sam backed away from the river, the rest of the cattle pressed in to drink, too.

Suddenly, the iron digging bar weighed her arms down with heaviness she couldn't ignore and her cheeks burned hot. Or maybe cold. Since she couldn't tell which, Sam decided to return to the house and warm up before doing anything else.

As she walked back across the bridge, she saw light streaming from the barn and heard the faint sound of the tack-room radio.

Sam knew she should return the shovel and digging bar to the barn before going into the warm kitchen. She didn't want to. She'd been picturing herself just dropping the heavy tools by the porch, but she tramped past the house and the beckoning smell
of hot cakes and bacon and tottered toward the barn.

She'd bet she hadn't been outside for even an hour. She could do it, she told herself, and a minute later, Dad's approval made the extra effort worth it.

At first he didn't look up, just considered the nylon halter he held and said, “Still like leather better, but can't fault these things for tough. Hardware gives out before the halter.”

Sam leaned the shovel and digging bar in a corner and slapped her hands—chilled from the metal, even through her gloves—against her legs.

“They all glad to see you?” he asked.

Sam looked up to see silent praise in Dad's brown eyes.

“Yeah.” She felt her frozen face reflecting his smile and realized this was what they both liked about ranching. On a good day, you got back what you put into it. She'd hated getting up in the dark and going out in the cold, but the animals had thanked her without words.

Dad nodded toward the radio. “Airport's open. No roads closed. Guess that means you'll be ridin' the bus in to pick up the kids for Trudy and Preston's—”

“Dream Catcher Camp,” Sam said. The name gave her wonderful chills, almost as much as the title they'd given her.

“Right.”

They both glanced up at a rustling sound in the rafters. Sam didn't see any pigeons, but they must
have been up there.

“I'm going to go in and eat,” Sam said, starting toward the barn door. “Shall I wait for you, Dad?”

“Be in soon,” Dad said. “You go on.”

She was probably imagining she could smell breakfast all the way out here, but the aroma drew Sam just the same. She took two steps before Dad said, “I'm proud of you for helpin' Trudy out.”

“It's just a day or two, and I haven't done anything yet,” Sam cautioned him.

She waved and started for the house.

Golden hot cakes and sizzling bacon. Her mouth watered and she didn't slow down, even when his voice reached her again.

“Soundin' more like a cowgirl every day, isn't she?” Dad asked, and Sam shook her head. Dad didn't make a habit of talking to himself.

T
he helicopter was out again, searching for horses, and Sam sat in a freezing-cold, nearly empty school bus with the one Dream Catcher Wild Horse camper who'd shown up. She might as well have been alone.

Sam pressed her forehead against the bus window, trying to see the chopper, but she couldn't. Only the vibration from its rotors told her it was out there.

“The men in that helicopter are looking for wild horses to round up and bring in for adoption,” Sam explained to the girl sitting beside her.

The girl's small hands twitched on her book, a nonfiction volume about horses. She nodded, but she didn't look out the window or glance up from the page she was reading.

Sam sighed. This was about the tenth time she'd tried to get the kid to talk. Was Darby Carter incredibly shy or just rude?

At the last minute, a phone call from Mrs. Allen had told Sam that she'd only be meeting one Dream Catcher camper, the girl from California. Sam had actually thought that would be kind of cool. She'd seen herself making friends with Darby Carter of Pacific Pinnacles, California, by answering her questions and telling her fun things about wild horses. So far, they weren't even acquaintances, let alone friends.

The stick-thin girl with a long black ponytail had plodded down the airport corridor with lowered eyes, and no matter what Sam did, Darby answered with the fewest words possible.

The instant Darby had settled into her seat—Sam had offered Darby the one next to the window, but she'd shaken her head “no”—the girl had pulled the book from the pocket of her pink Windbreaker and snapped it open. She sat with her shoulders shrugged up high, almost covering her ears.

Probably so she won't hear a word I say and have to answer me,
Sam thought.

With a sidelong glance, Sam noticed, again, how totally underdressed for the weather Darby was. Bony ankles showed between the hem of her jeans and her tennis shoes. The top she wore had short sleeves. Sam could see them right through the nylon
Windbreaker, and the sight made her shiver.

Darby might be from sunny southern California, but she was driving through the snow-covered desert in freezing temperatures. Mr. Pinkerton, the bus driver, must have noticed, too, because twice Sam had heard the bus's heater huff hotter. Not that the adjustment took the chill off the cavernous vehicle. The heater only magnified the smell of old sack lunches. Sam tried not to smell the bananas, peanut butter, and limp lettuce. If she'd only had herself to think about, she would have chosen cold over that odor.

“Are you warm enough?” Sam asked.

When Darby opened her mouth to answer, her teeth chattered.

“I have an idea,” Sam said.

Walking carefully up to the front of the moving bus, aware of Mr. Pinkerton's eyes watching her in the mirror, Sam unzipped the plastic covering on the emergency blanket next to the first-aid kit clamped to the bus wall.

“Can I use this?” Sam asked, just to be polite.

“Sure,” Mr. Pinkerton said. He'd been talkative on their way to the airport, but now that they were within twenty miles of Deerpath Ranch, he looked weary and sounded cranky as he added, “Don't know what's wrong with this radio.” He gave it a thump. “Not that it matters. Everyone in the bus barn is on vacation. Except for me.”

Over hissing static, Sam heard a beeping, and Mr. Pinkerton grumped that it was unlikely anyone would hear his transmissions except for bored citizens' band radio operators who got a kick out of eavesdropping on official conversations.

He probably couldn't wait to get rid of them, and Sam didn't blame him. Even as a brand-new driver, she knew the weather conditions made the road slippery.

Mr. Pinkerton had complained that though the fresh snow wasn't deep, there'd been that cold snap this morning and yesterday's snow had turned icy. He felt safer driving slowly, so it might take a long time to reach the ranch.

Sam figured as soon as he dropped her and Darby off at Blind Faith Mustang Sanctuary, he'd head for the warmth of Clara's coffee shop, where his girlfriend Junie worked as a waitress.

Sam touched each seat back for balance as she made her way back down the aisle toward Darby.

“There's some of those little heat packets in the first-aid kit, you know, the little disposable hand warmers?” Mr. Pinkerton said before Sam had gone too far. He reached up to open the metal clasp holding the kit closed. “Just save me one of them. I'm thinking I'll have to get out and put on the tire chains before we reach the ranch.”

Sam started to turn back around, but Darby's protest stopped her.

“No, I don't need it,” Darby said.

“If you're sure,” Mr. Pinkerton said, and his hand dropped back to the steering wheel.

Sam shrugged and kept walking back to her seat.

Darby stifled a cough as Sam settled beside her and draped the blanket over their laps and legs.

Was Darby sick? Sam kept her eye on the girl. When she breathed, her chest seemed to draw in instead of swelling outward. And she was awfully pale.

“I bet you paid for this trip yourself, didn't you?” Sam blurted.

Darby couldn't help but react. Her head snapped to face Sam. Brown eyes that looked too big for her face stared at Sam as if she were psychic.

“How did you know?” she gasped. Her breath whistled a little as she did.

“You love horses,” Sam said, pointing at the book, “and even though you have a cold or something, you still came.”

Darby looked down at her book again and her cheeks colored for the first time.

“I'd do the same thing,” Sam told her. “You wouldn't believe the things I've done for horses.”

“Like what?” Darby asked in a rattly whisper.

This time when she coughed, Darby pressed her hand against her chest, trying to make herself stop. When she finally did, Sam thought Darby looked almost blue around the lips. That couldn't be good, but the girl was finally starting to open up, so Sam kept talking.

“Like, well…” Sam's first thoughts were of the Brahma bull, feral dogs, and a cougar. Put all together, it sounded pretty bad. “Uh, probably stuff I shouldn't tell you.”

Darby's eyes lowered to her book. Her shoulders hunched up all over again.

Nice going,
Sam told herself, then decided she'd tell. What did it matter? The kid lived somewhere near Hollywood, according to Preston. How likely was it that Darby would copy the crazy things she'd done?

“I sneak out at midnight to see this wild horse who's a friend of mine.”

Darby kept reading.

“No, really,” Sam told her. “He was my horse when I was little, but he, uh, got loose and now he's wild, but sometimes he comes back to visit.”

Darby glanced up long enough to roll her eyes and say, “I'm twelve, not stupid.”

Sam laughed out loud. She hadn't expected Darby to have a smart mouth once she opened it.

“I know it sounds far-fetched,” Sam said, “but I'm telling you the truth.”

It's amazing what love can do,
Sam thought, but the words were too sappy to say. Instead, she searched the landscape for her horse, just as she'd been doing all week.

“I keep”—Sam pressed her face against the freezing glass again—“thinking I might see him, but most
wild horses have gone to shelter. I probably won't see him again until spring.”

“What about the helicopter?”

So she
had
been listening.

“The pilots fly back over the canyons and scare them out into the open,” Sam said. “I'd like for you to see some mustangs in the wild, before we get to the ranch, but if they're run into a trap and captured—”

“Here come a bunch,” Mr. Pinkerton muttered. He didn't sound happy about it.

A memory flickered through Sam's mind, of the time Mr. Pinkerton had reported her to the principal for getting off the bus and going to the Phantom. This time, Sam felt a lurch as the bus driver took his foot off the gas pedal. Because of the icy road, he was trying to slow down without slamming on the brakes.

“I see them! I do!” Darby pointed across the aisle through the windows. Sam saw them, too.

Holding on to the backs of the seats for balance, they crossed to the other side of the bus.

“Sit down,” Mr. Pinkerton snapped, and they did.

Spike and Yellow Tail bounded over the frozen range.

“Are they playing?” Darby asked.

At first they did look playful, but then Sam noticed the horses' wide-open mouths and the dark patches of sweat marking their coats.

“They're tired. And out of breath,” Sam said. “The helicopter is pushing them pretty hard.”

“Pushing them where?” Darby asked.

“I don't know.” Her own words set off a surge of fear, and Sam ducked down so that she could see out each window. The helicopter had to be aiming the young stallions somewhere, but the closest trap she could think of was at Lost Canyon, and the horses were headed in the wrong direction for that.

Then, the helicopter raised higher off the snowy range and buzzed ahead of the horses. Its roar sounded above the bus as it crossed the highway.

“I think he's trying to turn them,” Sam said.

“No,” Darby whispered.

Sam glanced over to see that Darby's knuckles were pressed against her mouth.

As the helicopter stopped herding them, Spike skidded to a stop. Bay haunches tucked like a roping horse, he threw up clots of snow and halted short of the road, then swung around and galloped west.
Back toward the trap,
Sam thought, sighing.

But the golden chestnut kept coming. Yellow Tail's hooves seemed to float above the snow and he didn't hesitate. Full of his own speed, he galloped on. Even when the helicopter passed over his head, pursuing Spike, the stallion thought of nothing but running.

If he kept coming, the bus and the horse would collide!

“Stop!” Sam screamed.

There was no squeal of brakes. The bus tires hissed.

Sam grabbed the seat in front of her and stared out the windshield. She saw Mr. Pinkerton's hands fly on the steering wheel. Out of the windshield she saw only white. Something fell clanging inside the bus. She and Darby ducked instinctively, but nothing hit them before the
boom
.

Scraping, tipping, falling across the aisle, hitting her knee, shoulder striking metal, hearing a sound like a garbage can rolling in a high wind—and then, suddenly, they stopped.

Dizzy, head spinning though her body wasn't, Sam opened her eyes. She swallowed to keep back the nausea threatening to make her vomit.

At first, what Sam saw didn't make sense. A skylight? And a bundle lay on top of her.

It moved.

Sam flinched from whatever it was, until she heard harsh breathing that wasn't hers.

Darby. She was in the bus with Darby, a frail twelve-year-old. She was supposed to be in charge. The mustang mentor. And the bus had—what? Rolled over? Hit the stallion? Run off the road into a ditch?

That wasn't a skylight overhead, Sam realized. Those were the windows. The bus had rolled, but not far. It lay on its side.

“Sam?”

With a shivery laugh, Sam knew she'd never been so glad to hear her own name.

“I'm here. Darby, where are you?”

Bony elbows and knees told Sam more quickly than words that the bundle atop her was Darby.

“Don't move for a minute,” Sam said.

“At least the horses—” Darby gasped, not finishing the sentence. She started another one. “I've never seen snow 'til today, or ridden a horse. Ever.”

“Are you okay?” Sam asked, because the girl really wasn't making sense.

“Hawaii, where her family—
my
family's there! So, I haven't told my mom I love her, not since last New Year's. That was my New Year's resolution, have you ever heard of anything so mean? But I—”

“Darby!” Sam snapped the name, even as she wondered why she hadn't heard Mr. Pinkerton's voice yet.

Darby was wheezing. Was her chest crushed? Sam thought of Gabe trapped in a car. Nothing on
her
hurt, and Darby wasn't crying, but she was still gasping out disconnected words. Maybe they made no sense because Darby didn't have the breath to pronounce each word loudly enough to be heard.

“—because she's an actress. Not a very good one, but she won't go home to the islands. That's what she always says. Never go back to Kamuela, but I want to go. I
have
to go. Who else do you know that's descended from paniolo horse charmers?”

Sam hoped it was relief that made the other girl talk such nonsense. That would be a lot better than a head injury.

But Darby could be delirious. Whatever was wrong, she couldn't breathe. Sam felt Darby's small body arch, trying to suck in a breath.

“Stop talking.”

“I—”

“No. I mean it, Darby. Don't talk. Just breathe.”

Darby quit babbling, but she thrashed around as if searching for something, and then—

What was that sound? Sam felt chills on her nape. What was fizzing? Or spraying? Was something on the bus about to explode?

“What
was
that?” Sam asked. “Darby?” Sam really wanted a second opinion, because suddenly she was thinking of snakes. They couldn't live in snow, of course, but what if one had lain curled up in some warm niche in the bus until the tumbling shook it loose?

“My medicine,” Darby wheezed. “That sound was my inhaler. I have asthma.”

Of course you do
, Sam thought, going limp with relief.
How dumb am I?

Instead of saying that, though, Sam called out, “Mr. Pinkerton?”

He didn't answer and the silence unsettled Darby even more.

“I've gotta get out of here,” Darby said anxiously. “I want my mom.”

“You'll get your mom,” Sam assured her, pushing away thoughts of her own mother.