One Brave Cowboy (4 page)

Celia jerked away, but she took only one step back, fighting him off with a defiant stare. “You can ask
about Mark. Obviously I wasn't playing with Mark. I was busy doing chores, and, yes, that's my—”

“It's not your job. Your job is that boy right—”

“Hey, Mark.” Cougar strolled into the barn, flashing Celia a reassuring glance on his way to the cat's nursery. He squatted, touched Mark's shoulder and then a couple of kittens. “Are they all there? Did you take a head count?”

Mark pressed a kitten under Cougar's chin.

“Have you figured out how many boys and how many girls? I think the calico's a girl.” He stood easily, confident in the silence his appearance had created. Without moving from the position he'd taken, he looked directly at Celia and offered a soft, intimate, “Hi.”

“Hello.” Silken calm slid over her. “I understand you two have met.”

“Yeah, Mark introduced us.” Cougar reached down to ruffle Mark's hair. The boy looked up and smiled. “I'm glad you're here. You can help me pick out a horse.”

“My son and I have plans,” Greg said. “I just stopped in to see what she had to say about what happened yesterday. So far—”

“I came over with Logan,” Cougar told Celia. “Called first this time.”

“That must be why the boys brought some of the horses in,” she said.

He glanced at Greg as though he were an image
on a TV show that nobody was watching. “Mark and I can go take a look if you two need to talk.”

“Mark's with me.” Greg moved to block Celia's view of everyone but him. “It's my weekend. Long as you're both here, maybe you can explain exactly how my son came to be out in the road and why nobody saw him until he was nose to nose with—”

“Because he's quick, and he's small,” Cougar said. “Fate cut us a break. Be grateful.”

“Don't tell me to be grateful.” Greg pivoted and postured, hands on hips. “You don't know what we're dealing with here. But you will if I see any more evidence of emotional or psychological trauma.”

Cougar chuckled. “You wanna sue me for something that didn't happen? What are you, a lawyer?”

“No, but I have one.”

“Have at it, then. If I harmed this kid, I'll make sure—”

“He wasn't hurt,” Celia insisted quietly. “He's fine, and he doesn't need to hear this.”

“He can't hear, remember?” Greg's challenge swung from Celia to Cougar. “Doctors don't know why, but I do. It's because his mother left him to—”

“Greg, please. Let's not do this now. You know what's going to happen.” She continued to speak in hushed tones while Mark went right on attending to the kittens. He was protecting himself in ways that she could not, but still she would do what she could. Maybe he
didn't
hear, but she believed he
could,
and
when he was ready, he would. Meanwhile, he had keen senses, and she would not have him treated other wise.

She moved past Greg and caught Mark's attention. “Let's go have a look at the mustangs.”

“Hell with the mustangs,” Greg bellowed. “Next thing I know, you'll have him wandering into the path of a pack of wild horses.”

“They run in herds,” Cougar said.

“Put the cats down, Mark.” Greg grabbed Mark by the elbow and urged him to his feet. “We're going to Rapid City. We'll catch the snake show.” His big hand swallowed the child's small one. “Like I said, I've got a lawyer. We're not done yet, Cecilia. Not by a long shot.”

Cougar stood in the doorway and watched the boy tag along with his father, stretching his leash arm to its limit, dragging his toes in the dirt. He tamped down the urge to go after them, spring the ham-fisted trap and release the kid. Why wasn't there some kind of law against adults using kids to even a score? Maybe Cougar should make one. He'd gladly enforce it.

Come on, Mark's father, sue me.

“I'm sorry about that.” Celia's soft voice drew him back into her company, where his anger began to cool. “I guess you could tell, we aren't exactly on friendly terms. I try not to say very much when he gets going like that. It's pointless to try to talk with
him.” She touched his arm. “Thank you for understanding.”

“The guy already pissed me off once today, so the understanding part was easy. The hard part is watching Mark. He doesn't want to go.”

“I know. But Greg has his new court order.” She didn't sound too happy about it. “And his lawyer.”

“It's none of my business,” he reminded himself aloud. “Unless he wants it to be. In that case, bring it on.”

“I hope not,” she said with a sigh. “I'm tired of fighting. It's a distraction from figuring out what's best for Mark.”

She sure sounded tired, and he felt bad about that, even though he was pretty sure whatever distraction he'd just caused hadn't been a bad thing. The truth was, he'd headed straight for the barn when he saw the bread delivery truck parked beside her little blue Chevy. He was in the habit of filing away the details of every vehicle he saw, where he saw it and whether it might blow up in his face down the road. After the conversation he'd had with Mark's father at the store, he'd done the math in his head—ex plus ex—and he'd chosen to butt in. It had taken him all of two minutes to develop a strong dislike for the man and become Celia's natural ally.

Which might have just added to her difficulties, dumbass. You don't know what's going on between
these two people. When did you become lifeguard on this beach?

I saved a life yesterday, didn't I?

You came within an inch of ending one. Two, if you count yours.

“I don't have to pick out a horse today,” Cougar said. “I can wait for Mark.” Which was just a thought, in case anyone inside his head was listening.

“He loves them all. Whichever you choose, tell him you'll share. Come look.” Celia gestured toward the far side of the barn. She led, and he followed.

They rounded the corner of the building, clambered up the tall rail fence and peered past a set of corrals. At least a dozen young horses milled about in a small pasture.

“They'll let you handle it any way you want. Run them all into the pens for a close look, turn out the ones that don't interest you, let you run your own test on those that do.” She grabbed a piece of her sorrel-colored hair away from the wind and anchored it behind her ear. “It's fun to watch people make their selection. Sometimes they want the wildest one in the bunch. Other times you just know they're looking for one that looks like he's half asleep.”

“I want one that's almost as smart as I am.” He smiled at her. “But not quite.”

“You said Logan was here? He's the one you should confer with. Have you read his book?”

“His book?”

“The one about how he trains horses,” Celia said. “I can never remember titles, but it's the author's name that's important, and Logan Wolf Track is the real deal.”

“The real deal, huh?” Cougar smiled.
So that's what a real deal looks like.
“I figured he was a good trainer. Didn't know he'd written a book, though.”

“It's wonderful.” Celia scrambled back down the fence, and Cougar jumped down after her. “I knew nothing about horses when I started volunteering here, and my friend, Ann, gave me Logan's book. Ann's Sally's sister. She's a teacher, too. We both teach at…” She waved at something that caught her eye behind his back. “He's over here!”

Cougar turned to find “the real deal” striding in his direction. Logan had parked in front of the house, and Cougar had promised to be along in a minute. No questions had been asked, no comments exchanged.

“Sally's waiting for you to fill out some papers, cowboy,” Logan announced. “That's one woman you don't wanna keep waiting.”

“Why not? She kept me waiting.”

“That was yesterday. You keep her waiting today, you'll just be giving her time to think up something the sanctuary needs that nobody but you can provide.” Logan clapped his hand on Cougar's shoulder. “Because you're just that special.”

“What's your specialty?” Cougar asked Celia.

“Well, with a B.S. in education—Sally calls it a B.S. in BS-ing—we've found that I'm really good at distinguishing horse manure from boot polish.”

The men looked at each other.

“Shinola?” Celia insisted.
“Boot polish?”

Both men grinned. “Long story short, there was a time when she kept Sally waiting,” Logan told Cougar.

“I
'm going with one of the Paints.”

Cougar laid the form on Sally Night Horse's desk, most of the blanks, including the horse's ID number, finally filled in. He'd been leaning toward a bay that showed strong Spanish Mustang traits when Celia mentioned her son's attraction to the spotted horses, and the Medicine Hat gelding was the flashiest horse in the bunch.

“Good choice,” Logan said. The two men exchanged looks—Logan's knowing, Cougar's
what the hell
. “Medicine Hats are sacred, and that one has classic war bonnet markings. Brown ears, little brown cap on his head. He'll show nicely.”

“He'll cost you,” Sally said.

Sally Drexler Night Horse had a way of filling a room with energy. She was the positive charge in the Double D's power grid, and her latest project had her chugging ahead full steam, even when she had to power up her wheelchair. Her office furniture gave her wide berth, and even though she wasn't tied to the chair, she wasn't apt to explain or deny it, either. Sally was in charge.

Clearly when she said
pay up,
a guy was expected to ask, “How much?”

“Your cowboy ass planted firmly on the line. Or the fence.” Sally leaned to one side as though she were trying to get a look at the new applicant's backside. “In the saddle is good, too. We need eye candy for a documentary we're shooting.”

“That Paint is pretty sweet.” Cougar slid Logan a what's-up-with-this look. Logan chuckled.

“True, but you're the real bonbon. Put the two of you together…” She gave Cougar a sassy wink. “YouTube, here we come. And we'll be goin' viral.”

“What do I have to do?” Cougar asked. He barely knew what YouTube was, which was already considerably more than he cared to know.

“The woman who's doing the video—Skyler Quinn—Logan's son, Trace, knows her pretty well. Right, Logan? The Double D is giving Match.com a run for their money lately. They hook you up on paper—or what passes for paper these days—but
we make matches on the ground right here in horse heaven.”

Logan laughed. “Skyler has Trace carrying her camera bags and loving every minute of it, all right.”

“Sally's got talent,” Sally quipped as she started scanning his application. “My husband, Hank, may be the singer in the family, but I know a thing or two about harmony. I know future soul mates when I see them.”

She glanced over the edge of the paper and gave Cougar a loaded look with an enigmatic smile, which almost scared him. He was a private man, and right now she was holding some of the keys to his privacy on what had always passed for paper.

She went on reading, all innocence.

“Anyway, Skyler's out in Wyoming, and you're located in that beautiful, rugged, picturesque Wind River country. She'll love that.” Sally flipped the application in Cougar's direction and pointed to a blank space. “You forgot to fill out this part. Location, location, location.”

“I'm…kinda between locations.”

“What does that mean?”

“Between a VA hospital and a home site in Shoshone country,” he said impatiently.

The sergeant was supposed to have laid the groundwork here. If anybody had a problem with his recent history, he wasn't going to waste his time with any damned application. He'd been banged up
a little and spent some time getting his head straight. He wasn't about to open up his medical records to get into a horse contest.

“But you ranch,” Sally affirmed, adjusting her glasses as she took another look at what he was beginning to regard as his test paper.

“Did I say I'm ranching now?” The muscles in the back of his neck were threatening to knot up beneath the short hairs she was tugging on. “It doesn't say I'm still ranching. It says that's one of my qualifications. Right?”

In the time it took him to draw one of those cleansing breaths he'd been taught to practice, he was able to put everyone in the room out of his mind. It was just a piece of paper. “The answer to this question is ranching,” he said calmly as he tapped the word with an instructive finger. “And this one…Wind River is where I'm from.” He pushed the paper across the desk. “I put Sergeant Tutan down as a reference. Call her.”

Sally turned the paper over. “Mary's your only reference?”

“Why didn't you put me down?” Logan asked him. “You're bringing the mustang over to my place.”

“For a few days.” Had he accidently walked into a damn bank? He had half a mind to turn on his heel and walk out.

But his other half a mind remembered how far he'd have to walk to get to Sinte, where he'd left
his roof and his ride—the two things he owned the keys to.

And the whole of his mind was set on taking on that Paint gelding with the sweet brown “cap” pulled down over his ears. He had no idea what kind of endurance horse he'd make, but he didn't care about winning an endurance event. Running it from start to finish would do fine.

“I have a few acres. My brother and I turned our lease back and sold…” Be damned if he was going to stand here and recite his whole life story. He was glad Celia had gone back to the straightforward BS in the barn. “Look, I'm a civilian now, pretty much starting over.”

Sally looked up with a genuine, no BS smile. “All we need is a location and a description of your facilities.”

“Put down my place,” Logan told her. “Are you coming to the celebration? You and Hank?”

“Wouldn't miss it. I hear Mary's coming home.”

He turned to Cougar, grinning like a proud papa. “Don't say anything, but the celebration's for her. She just got a Commendation medal. Meritorious achievement. Did she tell you?”

“She didn't. That's some eagle feather to cap off a career.”

“No kidding.” Logan tapped Cougar's chest with the back of his hand. “You're coming, right? I need
a color guard. You got your uniform packed away in that trailer of yours?”

“Your Lakota VFW will want to do the honors.” Cougar had put his army green away for good. “But I'll be there. I'll step up to the microphone and pay tribute to her the Indian way.”

“Put down my place,” Logan urged Sally with the distinctively Indian version of a chin jerk.

“Cougar?” She wanted his word.

“Is that okay with you?” Cougar asked her.

“For now,” she said. “But if anything changes…”

“I'm not gonna run off with your horse.”

“I'm not worried about that, Cougar, and he's not my horse. I answer to the Bureau of Land Management, and you know how that goes. Red tape from here to Texas.”

“Stand down, soldier,” Logan said. “You're set for now. But you'll have to let Sally get some of that Shoshone country video footage she's lookin' for.”

“
Footage
is boring,” Sally said as she signed the form. She swung her chair and fed Cougar's commitment into her copier. She punched a button and followed up with a punch to the air. “Woo-hoo! Chalk up another Indian cowboy for the cause. Women are our target market, and they're not looking at your boots, boys.”

Cougar had to laugh. He took damn good care of his boots. Spit and Shinola.

“You have a clean barn, Sally.”

Cougar turned toward the voice. Celia stood in the office doorway, her shiny pink face framed by zigzagging tendrils of damp hair. The smudge on her jaw—some kind of boot polish, no doubt—called out for a friendly thumb to wipe it off. He rubbed his itchy palm on the outside seam of his jeans.

“Hey, Celia, thanks,” Sally said. “You want some lunch?”

“I wondered if you wanted me to grain the horses they just brought in.”

“Actually, I'm short-handed today, and there's something else I had in mind for you.” Sally's dramatic pause drew Cougar's attention. “We really depend on our volunteers. They're mostly women, and I just hate piling so much on such slim shoulders.”

Celia laughed. “Since when?”

“I know I don't thank you often enough, Celia, but I'm trying to do that right now,” Sally deadpanned. “And in a meaningful way.”

“I could help out while I'm here,” Cougar said. “What do you want done?”

Sally hiked up the corners of her mouth, nodded and winked at him in a way that just didn't seem right for a married woman. “Put the man to work, Celia,” she said.

Logan cleared his throat. “He rode over with me, and I have a—”

“Few hours to contribute? We're hauling bales and riding fence. Take your pick.”

“I'll have to take door number three,” Logan said. “The one marked Exit.”

“But you're already committed,” Sally said, cocking a finger at Cougar. “You'll be helping Celia, and she'll give you a ride back to Sinte.” She glanced at Celia. “Is that okay with you?”

“What's the assignment?”

“Find out how six of our horses got into Tutan's pasture.” Sally took off her glasses and waved them at Logan. “Your father-in-law—my damned neighbor—called the sheriff again. He doesn't believe in handling these things between neighbors.”

“My father-in-law.” Logan shook his head. “That's a real kicker.”

“I sent a couple of the kids out, but they came up empty, said they couldn't find any fence down. I just want to make sure. If there's a hole in that fence, we'll get it fixed before Mary gets back.” She made a smooth-sailing gesture. “Peace in the valley for Mary's sake. You think he'll show up at the celebration?”

“I doubt it. But she'll want to see her mother. She's only got three days this time.” Logan lifted one shoulder. “Kinda sorry I planned this party now. Only three days.”

“She's a short-timer,” Sally said. “Pretty soon she'll be home for good. But I wouldn't put it past your
father-in-law
to run our stock into his pasture just to stir things up again. Which is fine by me—
he cranks on his egg beater, I'll come back at him with my Mixmaster—but it's not fair to Mary.”

“You can pick your wife, but not your in-laws. Listen, I'm all for mending fences, and I'd stay and help with it, but I've got a meeting,” Logan told Cougar. He nodded at Sally. “Watch out for that one. She'll have you thanking her for letting you paint her fence.”

Sally laughed. “If he's lucky he'll get to stretch some wire, but there's nothing out there to paint. I'll tell you what, though, I can't wait to paint this house. I don't care how many people try to horn in, I'm saving it all for myself.” She wagged a finger at Cougar. “I might let you watch, but nobody's taking over on me.”

“She'll get takers. You watch.” Logan clapped a hand on Cougar's shoulder. “I gotta get goin'. I'll move the pickup so we can load up your mustang. I'll buy these two lunch, Sally. The Fence Rider's Special, on me.”

“One volunteer sponsorship. That's going on your tab, Wolf Track.”

“This woman knows how to rake in the donations,” Logan told Cougar. “Better than a cable TV preacher.” He gave Sally a two-fingered wave. “You oughta get yourself a show, Sally.”

“People in love are so generous. Gotta strike while they're hot,” Sally called out after Logan. Then she
gave Celia the calculating eye. “A weekly TV show. How could we work that?”

Celia glanced at Cougar. She was smiling. The horses weren't the Double D's only attraction for a woman packing some heavy cares. Cougar nodded, and her smile brightened even more.

“Oh! Speaking of hot irons,” Sally said. She was checking her watch. “Hank should be pulling in any time now. He's been out shoeing horses for a team-roping club, and I'm not gonna let him cool off just yet.” She rolled back from her desk, put her wheels in park and levered herself to her feet. “Just the thought makes me weak in the knees.

“So you guys get that horse loaded up and then help yourselves in the kitchen, will you? Pack up the Fence Rider's Special. Sandwiches, chips, water and a wire stretcher. Enjoy the ride.” She winked at Cougar as she reached past him for her cane. “I know I will.”

“Can't wait to meet her husband,” Cougar whispered to Celia as they headed for the front door.

“Hank's a lovely man, and Sally's the rising tide that lifts all boats,” Celia said. “She's unsinkable.”

Ordinarily Cougar might have doubted the notion on the grounds that the person simply hadn't waded in deep enough, but Sally was far from ordinary. And Celia? If he drowned in the woman's eyes, it wouldn't be a bad way to go. As long as he didn't come bobbing back up to the surface and find him
self in a mud puddle. He'd been there, and he wasn't going back.

He wasn't looking forward to loading a wild horse into a trailer, either, but Logan had him covered. No pushing, no pulling, no slapping. The closest thing Cougar had ever witnessed to Logan's display of patience was a dog training session with Staff Sergeant Mary Tutan, which led him to conclude that theirs was a match made in the kind of heaven where dogs and horses—the Lakota
sunka
and
sunka wakan
—dwelled side by side with human spirits. The notion made a pretty picture for Cougar to file among the good places he regularly sought for refuge when ugly thoughts crowded his damaged head.

“The Paint doesn't have a schedule,” Logan said. “And we won't try to give him one. If our time runs out, we'll walk away and come back later.”

Logan instructed Cougar to approach the trailer
beside
the horse, not ahead or behind, and to remember that horses were naturally claustrophobic. Cougar had no trouble sympathizing with that particular fear. It was one of several he'd brought home with him.

It turned out he'd chosen a horse that was compliant by nature, and Logan was able to drive away with him in time to make his meeting.