Wildfire (8 page)

“Do you really think Socks will be okay?”

“I hope so—for Claire’s sake. She loves that old mare like one of her kids.”

“Or more so.” Tessa gave a rueful laugh. “The sad thing is that it’s taken old age for her to allow even a glimpse of her softer side. Do you ever what she would’ve been like, if Dad hadn’t died so young?”

“I don’t even remember him.” Leigh’s expression turned wistful. “Do you?”

“Barely. Hearing him laugh, I guess. Otherwise, I’m not sure which memories are real, and which stem from what someone else said. I know…well, that they didn’t have the happiest marriage.”

Leigh rolled her eyes. “Can you imagine our mother ever giving an inch on
anything?
”

“The McAllisters don’t have a great history of marital success, but Janna and Michael sure seem solid. And if anyone can succeed, it’ll be you and Cole. That man
adores
you.”

“I just want to make it past the wedding. I’ve had almost no time to work on it, and it’s less than four weeks away.”

The cell phone at her hip rang, and she answered quickly, then pulled a notepad from the back pocket of her coveralls and wrote something down.

“I have to go,” she said as soon as she hung up and jammed the phone back in its holster. “A horse ran through a fence and has some severe lacerations. I’ll come back tomorrow to check on Socks.”

She started toward her truck, then turned back. “I heard over the scanner that another batch of wildfires has started about five miles from town. Deliberately set, according to the fire crews.”

“That’s what I heard, too. Who could be that crazy? This whole area could go up in smoke.”

Leigh nodded. “And I keep wondering if a single person is behind all of this…and if it’s the same guy who’s been harassing you. Be careful, Tess. You could still be in danger.”

L
eigh’s words replayed through Tessa’s thoughts long after her sister left on the vet call, and during the long drive back to Snow Canyon Lodge, when Tessa took their mother home.

Clearly tired after her day at the ranch, Claire headed straight inside to her bedroom, but Janna came out to visit. Michael pulled in just minutes later.

“Glad to see you, Tess,” he said as he climbed out of his patrol car and strolled over to Tessa’s truck. “I’ve got news…sort of.”

She smiled. “I hope it’s good.”

“I called in a favor at the state crime lab, and have an answer on that evidence from your burglary. The only identifiable prints were from you or your mother.”

Disappointment washed through her. “So the intruder wore gloves, then.”

“Probably.”

“And I didn’t find anything at all when I cleaned up that mess. Would’ve been awfully nice to find some really obvious clue.” Feeling defeated, she sighed. “Maybe it was just a random, one-time deal. Someone who thought the McAllisters keep piles of money sitting around, and found that he’d totally wasted his time.”

A corner of Michael’s mouth lifted. “You wouldn’t’ believe how many people make that assumption. They give me a sly grin and wink, if my marriage to Janna comes up.”

Janna grinned and bumped him with her elbow. “Maybe you’ll have that kind of success, once this resort takes off.”

“It should. Your Web site is beautiful, and this has to be the prettiest place on the planet.” Tessa turned to Michael. “Leigh tells me the most recent wildfires were probably set. Is that true?”

“They weren’t ignited by lightning. But whether they were set intentionally or started by careless campers, we don’t know yet.”

Tessa shivered. “This whole area is tinder-dry. If there’s enough wind and the wrong location, it could be devastating.”

“We’re already evacuating homes and campgrounds west of Shawnee Creek. That one started on private land and spread into the national forest within hours. Over five hundred acres are gone already. It could be in the thousands by daybreak, if the incident management team can’t contain it.”

“Are you seeing any pattern?” Janna wrapped her arms around her middle.

“The last three have started close to some luxury cabins that were burgled.” He looked over his shoulder toward the towering mountains forming the western horizon. “Two fires were discovered by deputies responding to security system alarms. I hear the fire season hasn’t started this early in years.”

With the breeze coming from the west, the air was hazy and acrid with smoke, and Tessa’s eyes burned. “Guess I’d better go. I still have evening chores, and I should get into town and visit Gus.”

Michael shot a quick glance at Janna, nodded, then touched Tessa’s shoulder. “We’d be happy to welcome you, Gus and Sofia over here, if you’d feel safer. Your friend, too.”

Surprised, Tessa laughed, sure that it had been Janna’s idea. A warm feeling curled around her heart at the relationships with her sisters that were deepening after far too many years of estrangement. “That’s nice of you, but we’re good. All of my work is over there, and I’d spend hours commuting. Thanks, anyway.”

“Both of us are concerned, Tess,” Janna looped an arm through the crook of Michael’s elbow. “I just keep thinking about the day someone shot at you. Maybe he’s the one breaking into the cabins, and is afraid you saw too much. So he tore up your office as sort of a warning.”

Tessa smiled. “You do have a good imagination. This is little Wolf Creek, Wyoming, not some drama on TV.”

“No, it’s not,” Janna said urgently. “It’s
scary.
I agree with Leigh—this is all connected somehow, and I think the guy is escalating. And someone is going to get hurt.”

Josh was an adequate rider, though he hadn’t grown up on horseback like the McAllisters. But one glance at the pack horses kept in a small pasture by Tessa’s barn, and he knew they were in serious trouble.

He parked the four-wheeler and studied the animals through the fence.

It was late afternoon, and they looked drowsy, like they usually did on warm summer afternoons. They were probably still tired from their long pack trip over the weekend. But two of the five horses were moving oddly, with a random, stumbling gait.

One of them made its way to the water tank, where it plunged its muzzle into the water, obviously thirsty but not coordinating well enough to drink. The other one seemed to be mouthing something, its lips twitching and tongue flicking in and out. The motion reminded him of a dog when given a piece of a peanut butter sandwich that was sticking to the roof of its mouth.

The two mules, however, looked perfectly content and were eating at a pile of something fresh and green at the farthest end of the corral.

He called Tessa’s cell phone. No answer, but he left a message.

Then he limped over to Gus and Sofia’s cabin, but she was gone—probably at the care center once again.

After trying the phone number at Snow Canyon Lodge, he went back to the corral and watched the horses for a while longer.

None of them seemed to be in pain, exactly, and they had plenty of water, shade, and a nice pile of green…whatever, at the far end of the corral, so they had plenty to eat.

He debated, then tried Tessa’s phone once more before calling Leigh for her veterinary opinion. Would Tessa resent his presumption in calling a vet? So be it—those horses didn’t look right, and losing any of them would be a big blow to her business.

Leigh called him back in ten minutes. She fired off a series of questions and seemed strangely interested in the fact that the mules were fine and happily munching the pile of greenery in their pen while only the horses appeared to be affected.

With urgent orders for him to remove all of the feed immediately, she promised to reach the ranch within an hour or two—as soon as she finished emergency surgery on a llama.

After driving the four-wheeler to the far side of the corral to take the food away from the mules, Josh parked in the shade near the corral, slid his backpack-style camera bag from his shoulders, and lifted out his Canon EOS-5D.

It still felt light and unfamiliar in his hands, after years of working with his rugged old favorite, but it offered triple the megapixels and far better image quality. And once he’d started shooting photos of the drought conditions here, he’d begun envisioning the creation of a coffee-table book focusing on the wild beauty of this land.

He limped over to the fence and snapped off a few dozen frames of the mules, their heads low and long ears flopping over as they dozed. The two horses looked even worse than they had before.

It was clear that Tessa was operating on a shoestring here. He had no idea what a good pack horse might cost, but losing the entire string would have to be bad news for her business, and lead to expensive cancellations.

He glanced at his watch, then made his way back to the four-wheeler and climbed on, propping his cast on a fender.

For the past week, he’d been taking the little vehicle on fact-finding trips. Snapping hundreds of photographs of government land and cattle. The deep trails the animals carved across the fragile land where the soil was desperately thin and the grass sparse.

He’d made a couple of trips to town as well—by borrowing the ranch truck with the automatic transmission, so he could manage with one foot, then leaving a couple of twenties on Tessa’s kitchen counter in repayment, each time he went.

Surprising, how approachable people were after he’d awkwardly navigated through the doors of a café and settled down at a table for coffee and the local newspaper.

When they learned that he wanted to write a series of articles on the West, they invariably settled in for long conversations, and if they agreed to being quoted, he added those notes to his growing stack of files.

Sylvia expected him to let her down, but it wasn’t going to happen. Not when he had so much at stake.

Except now…some of his preconceptions were changing, after talking with people whose lives were so deeply tied to the land, so greatly affected by hardships out of their control.

“Yellow star thistle,” Leigh announced as she sifted through the pile of green vegetation that Josh had taken away from the mules. “It only affects horses—not mules or burros.”

The plants looked like ordinary weeds to him, with a few tiny yellow flowers here and there. “So this is poisonous?”

“You bet, though it usually takes a month or two of ingesting it to show the worst signs. It causes a neurological disorder—a lot like Parkinson’s in people.”

Josh frowned, and glanced at the corral. “So you think these horses have had access to it for that long?”

“If they’re showing significant symptoms, yes.” She paced across the small pasture, studying the sparse vegetation, then returned. “But I don’t see any of that weed growing out here. Every rancher knows it’s bad and tries to eradicate it when they find some spreading onto their land.”

“But these horses are kept close to the barn, so they’re handy for pack trips. They aren’t out on the main pastures at all.”

Leigh climbed over the fence and hunkered down next to the pile of yellow star thistle. She picked up a stem and studied it closely, then another. “I hoped that maybe there was just a random stand of this stuff growing at the end of the pasture—something natural. But these stems were cut, Josh. By something sharp—probably a scythe.”

Their eyes met, and he instantly knew what she was thinking. “Someone went to a lot of work, you know that? Cutting all of this…secretly bringing it out here.”

“Some horses develop a real taste for this stuff, and will choose it over good grass, crazy as that sounds. Maybe this guy figured it would always be eaten by morning so no one would be the wiser. And it worked, until you noticed something today.”

“So how much would a horse have to eat?”

She glanced over her shoulder at the two horses that looked the most ill. “Someone must’ve been here a number of times. What I don’t understand is
why.
I mean, if he wanted to cause trouble, why wouldn’t he just shoot the horses and be done with it?”

“Too obvious,” Josh said decisively. “The sheriff would be called right away. But something more natural…well, animals get sick, they die. So what’s the prognosis?”

“Not good. We’re dealing with a neurotoxin, and there really isn’t an effective treatment with this one. With rest and time…well, hopefully, they’ll come out of it, since they won’t be eating any more of that plant. But there’s no guarantee, and sometimes euthanasia is the only option.”

“So they won’t be usable for some time?”

“If ever.” She turned to leave. “I’ll bring my dog over a little later. Elvis is a sweetheart, but he’d rather welcome a thief than bark at him. Hobo is a
serious
watch dog.”

“He won’t just skedaddle for home?”

“I’ll set up a wireless transmitter for an electric dog fence, and he’ll wear a radio collar, so he’ll stay within the vicinity of the barns and corrals. Believe me, he’ll let you know if anyone shows up.” She glanced at her watch. “I’ve got to get going, but I’ll call Michael and tell him about this on the way to my next stop.”

Josh watched her leave, then he turned back to the horses. What kind of person would purposely poison such beautiful animals and make them suffer?

It didn’t take long to come up with some answers.

This wasn’t just random malice. It had taken time, and effort, and planning. It was personal, and it was directed at Tessa.

Without her string of pack horses, her business would flounder. Replacing them would be an expensive and lengthy process, and in the meantime, she’d have to cancel scheduled trips and would probably lose some of those customers for good.

So who would profit most if that happened?

T
essa had been out checking on her cattle—something she was doing several times a week now, given that ten head were still missing—and had been out of reception range.

But the minute Tessa got back to her truck, loaded Dusty into the horse trailer, and climbed behind the wheel, she checked her messages.

There were three from clients, asking about upcoming pack trips into the mountains. Two from Danny, who said he wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be coming in today or tomorrow to help with the either of the scheduled half-day rides. One from Kirby Fellows from the feed store, with a disturbing comment about Josh…something that she would need to start watching.

And then there was the message from Josh himself.

She listened to it twice, then snapped her phone shut, turned on the ignition and headed back to the home place, her anger and frustration growing with every mile.

It wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair.

Some of the people in these parts had good reason to hold a grudge, given Claire’s iron will and ruthlessness in business dealings, but Tessa couldn’t undo the past anymore than she could stop the sun from setting. She’d done nothing but work hard and try to deal honestly with everyone in this town.

Yet old feelings died hard, and some people refused to forgive and forget. And someone seemed determined to see the McAllisters pay dearly for whatever harm they’d caused in the past. There certainly wasn’t a lack of possibilities on that score.

Until now, Tessa had wanted to believe that her minor gunshot wound was an accident, and the break-in at her house was just a random incident—probably by the person who’d been burglarizing cabins in the area. But this—an attempt to destroy her pack string and ruin her business—put everything into perspective.

Just as Janna had said, someone was after her, and this person was escalating. Were they responsible for the theft of her cattle as well? And how could she ever figure out who this elusive, faceless person was, who seemed to be craftily assaulting her life from different angles?

It would be like trying to capture the wind.

After unloading Dusty and unhitching the trailer, Tessa strode over to the pasture she used for the pack horses and slipped inside.

The two mules and three of the horses looked up at her with mild curiosity and then kept grazing. But the other two horses stood together at the far end of the pasture, and even from a distance she could see something was wrong.

Both of them appeared dazed and were displaying the usual signs of star thistle poisoning—the twitching of their lips and the odd chewing motion. It was rare, now that ranchers were aware of the danger. But Tessa had seen the strange syndrome as a child, and she’d never forgotten it.

On her way into the barn, she speed dialed Leigh, but only reached her voice mail. Then she called Michael and had to leave a message on his cell phone when he didn’t answer, either.

At least Socks seemed to be doing well. The old mare nickered softly when Tessa appeared at the front of her stall, and she moved without significant lameness to press her muzzle against the bars for a quick scratch.

“How is she?”

Josh’s voice echoed down the long, dark aisle, and Tessa looked up to see him silhouetted against the bright, early evening sunshine. “Better. I’m just hoping we caught her in time, so she doesn’t have permanent damage.”

He came down the aisle, his one crutch and the cast giving him an uneven gait. Despite Kirby’s troubling message, she still felt a little thrill of awareness when he stopped and looked down at her, his thickly lashed hazel eyes filled with compassion.

He made her feel delicate, feminine, and protected; feelings that she hadn’t allowed herself for years, because there was no place for that softness when a woman had to run a ranch single-handed…

She blinked, seeing for the first time the parallel between herself and her mother—only Claire had managed the ranch and raised three young daughters at the same time, which made her life a hundred times more challenging than Tessa’s.

The thought was scary and sad at the same time, as Tessa saw her future unfolding through the years ahead. Would she end up as hard and emotionless as Claire, with nothing on earth more important to her than this ranch?

Josh touched her shoulder, sending a shiver through her that had nothing to do with the dark, cool shadows in the barn. “Are you all right?”

“Fine. Totally fine.” She reined in her foolish thoughts and straightened her spine. “I got your message about the pack horses. I really owe you—I would’ve been home after dark, and I wouldn’t have caught the problem until tomorrow.”

“You’ll have a better alarm system after this. Your sister is bringing over her dog.”

Tessa smiled at that. “No one will get past Hobo. That’s one very hyper dog.”

“She also called Michael, so he’s aware of what happened. Did she tell you that someone must have come here a number of times to leave those toxic weeds for your horses?”

Tessa nodded, her smile fading. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it happening. But I’m gone so much during the day, and often get back after dark.”

And it’s far harder to run this place alone then I’d ever imagined.

“Someone was pretty crafty. If I hadn’t been riding past on the four-wheeler, I wouldn’t have noticed what those mules were eating down at the end of the pasture. You couldn’t have seen it from the gate up by the barn.”

“That’s one of the frightening aspects of this whole situation. Someone is carefully thinking all of this through, and finding ways to cause trouble. And I don’t even know why.”

He glanced around, then moved to the side of the aisle and sat on a bale, propping his crutch against the stall behind him. He patted the space next to him. “Here, come into my office. We need to talk.”

She wavered.

“I’m not going to bite, I promise.”

That felt like a challenge, and a challenge had always been hard for her to ignore. She sat at the far end of the bale, drew her feet up, and wrapped her arms around her knees. “I need to talk to you, too.”

He tipped his head in agreement, without so much as a hint of guilt or hesitation. “You first.”

“Why are you here, Josh?”

He did a double take at that, then grinned. “You. Remember? You brought me here.”

She waved away his words with an impatient flip of her hand. “No. Why are you
here
—in this part of Wyoming?”

“A photo assignment, just as I said.” He lifted a shoulder in a slight shrug. “Though I’m way behind on it now.”

She had a feeling they’d be going in circles for the next hour, if she didn’t cut to the chase. “Kirby Fellows says you’ve been asking a lot of questions around town. He thinks you’re here to stir up trouble.”

Josh angled a look at her. “Trouble?”

She reined in her impatience. “I think you know what I mean. All the photos. Talking to people. You’ve even done it to me—asking lots of questions about the drought, and about government grazing allotments. So is that what your trip is really about? Some sort of exposé for an environmental group?”

“I’m not here to cause you any trouble,” he said after a long pause. “I’m just completing my last assignment for a magazine. But yes, I’m photographing the impact of this long-term drought.”

“With a slant, right? To show that the ranchers are careless? That we’re thoughtlessly overusing the land?”

“You can’t deny that the land here is fragile. That the topsoil is thin and the growing season is short.”

“Of course not.”

“And there’s already an ample elk and deer population up on those summer ranges.”

“True, but
you
can’t deny that the ranchers are careful. We’re allowed a limited number of cattle up there, and we all follow that to the letter. And we carefully rotate those herds.” She pushed off the bale and strode a few yards, then turned back, her tension rising. “That grass is lush this time of year, but it certainly isn’t in our best interest to overgraze it. Why would we risk permanent damage? It would be a classic case of shooting ourselves in the foot.”

“Maybe some of the other ranchers aren’t quite that careful.”

“So I suppose they’re the ones you want to find?”

“Actually, I’m trying to present a balanced view,” he said quietly.

“Right. But you didn’t say a word to me until now, which implies you wanted to keep it a secret. I can just imagine how
balanced
it will be. Most of the families around here have held on to their allotments for fifty, sixty years. Without the use of that land, few of us could run enough cattle to stay in business.” She clenched her fists at her side, angry at him. Disappointed at herself for not seeing his real motivation for being here.

And all too aware that once again, Claire had been right.

“Even if we’re on different sides of this issue, I care about you, Tessa.” He met her gaze with frank honesty in his own. “Why would I do anything to hurt you?”

Why, indeed.
Memories from the past slammed into her thoughts, robbing her of coherent speech. She’d trusted him implicitly long ago. But was he really at fault for what happened? Wasn’t she, as well?

He leaned back against the stall, still watching her expression. “I’m not sure what else I can say, other than to give you my word and ask that you trust me.”

She managed a faint nod.

“Not exactly an enthusiastic response, but it’s a start.” His mouth lifted in a faint smile as he solemnly offered his hand. “Friends—a little?”

She hesitated. “A little.”

She briefly pressed his hand, all too aware of the tingling sensation that danced across her skin at his touch. Wishing she didn’t still feel that same attraction.

“Good, because we need to discuss something else.” The playful note in his voice vanished. “You need to think about who would profit most if this ranch or your outfitting business failed. Who would have the motivation to make that happen?”

She poked at a frayed hole in the knee of her jeans. “The other outfitters, I suppose. But most have smaller operations like mine, and I’ve never noticed any resentment or jealousy. The big companies shouldn’t care. They’ve got huge budgets for advertising and have upscale facilities, and they book customers a year in advance. Why would they worry about a small operation like mine? It just doesn’t make sense.”

“But there’s a limited pool of clients out there, and a lot of those people probably research vacation destinations all winter, looking for the best experience for their money, not necessarily a luxury package.” He cocked an eyebrow. “Had any recent encounters with those other operators lately?”

“At the feed store or the grocery, now and then. We all just say hi and go on. And then there’s Arlen, who owns Whiskey River Outfitters. He’s always telling me that he wants to buy me out, and makes little comments about how much more successful his business is. But if he really had an agenda, I doubt he’d be so open about it.”

“You don’t think he’s serious?”

“Oh, he’s serious all right. He’s got the money, and I really do think he’d like to buy me out. But I’d have to be starving to ever let that happen, because he’s one of the most arrogant men I know. And honestly, my company poses little threat to his. So why would he risk legal problems by doing anything underhanded?”

“Anyone else?”

She thought for a minute. “As far as the ranch is concerned, hungry real estate investors are always looking for prime property. No one comes to mind, though.”

They fell silent, listening to the sound of horses swishing their tails at flies and stamping their feet.

“The irony is that no one would have to risk doing anything aggressive,” she continued. “With the drought and poor cattle prices, plus the loans we’ve had to take out, the financial status of this ranch is rocky. We could spiral into bankruptcy and foreclosure in the next couple years, easily.”

“It can’t be as bad as all that.”

“No? I’ve got a $12,000 note due in less than two weeks. And unless I can pull together a shipment of cattle before then, I won’t be able to pay it off.” She felt a melancholy tug at her heart. “That would damage our credit rating, which would make future loans at a decent rate nearly impossible…and the collateral was a section of the ranch, so there we’d be in trouble, too.”

“Can you pay it off?”

“You bet I will. I’ll have to let some good breeding stock go, and tonight I’m listing my custom-made saddle on one of the Internet auction sites. You can’t find new ones by this maker anymore, and the vintage models usually go for at least three grand.”

Josh whistled under his breath. “Amazing.”

“It was a gift from my Uncle Gray for my high school graduation. With the sterling conchos and lacing on the cantle and gullet, it should go for a lot more.” She looked up at Josh and tried for a nonchalant tone. “There’s no room for sentiment anymore. What matters is holding onto this ranch.”

He hesitated, then curved an arm around her shoulders for a hug. “By this time next year, everything will be back on track. Your troublemaker will be cooling his heels in jail, the drought will be over, and cattle prices will go through the roof.”

She smiled. “I like your version of the future a lot better than mine.”

“Just keep an eye out, Tess. If someone is after some sort of crazy, secret retaliation against you, it can’t stay a secret forever. You or someone else will notice something unusual—some clue—and we’ll get it figured out before I leave here. I don’t want to go until that happens.”

Leave?
The word startled her, and she looked up at him in surprise. She’d been hesitant about offering him a place to stay. But he’d been here over three weeks now, and he was becoming part of the fabric of life at the ranch. The thought of him moving on filled her with a sense of loss she hadn’t expected.

“So…how soon will you get that cast off?” Embarrassed by the shaky note in her voice, she playfully nudged him with her elbow and slid over to the far end of the bale. “I can only imagine how much you’re going to miss it.”