To Tame a Cowboy (Colorado Cowboys #3)(3)
“If you want,” she said, “I can ride over to the Middletons’. You know I’m good with foals. I’ll have that sweet thing nursing before you get there.”
“You have a gentle touch with all horses. Not just foals.” Mr. Pritchard’s voice contained a note of pride.
“I’ve learned everything I know from you.”
“No, Savannah. The truth is, some men—and women—are born with a natural ability to relate to creatures. And you’re one of them.”
If only everyone felt the same way. Even though Daddy was more supportive of her tramping around with Mr. Pritchard than Momma had ever been, he still held to the traditional view that such work was best left to men. But he’d humored her and allowed her more freedom in that regard.
Savannah smiled. “So you’ll let me ride ahead to the Middletons’?”
He chuckled at what he must have perceived as her eagerness. “I’ll deliver you there and then head over to Smith Fork.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Just don’t let your father know I left you unattended. If he finds out, he’ll never let you accompany me again.”
“I promise I won’t say anything if you don’t.” She swallowed the discomfort at knowing she was putting Mr. Pritchard into a difficult situation.
She had to push it aside. This once. And pray that eventually everyone would forgive her for what she had to do.
CHAPTER
2
“You kick that horse one more time, I’ll be kicking you.” Brody McQuaid spread his feet wide and crossed his arms.
Though Brody’s voice was low and quiet, traffic on Fairplay’s Main Street came to a halt around him quicker than if he’d shouted. The cowhand, in the middle of lifting his boot, paused.
The mustang lay on the ground right where it’d collapsed, a dun mare, her flanks heaving in and out, showing ribs and a whole passel of scars and open wounds. Worst of all, a gouge in the horse’s forearm oozed blood. She was injured. Bad. And needed attention, not a savage beating.
With fingers spread clawlike over his six-shooter, the cowhand straightened and pivoted. The evening sun hit the man full in his face, revealing the broken teeth and bent nose of Lonnie Quick. Stirrup Ranch foreman. An ornery cuss of a man if there ever was one.
Brody shoulda known. Nearly every horse at Stirrup Ranch wore marks. And nearly every horse there was scared of his shadow and jumped at the sight of a June bug.
“I don’t think I heard you right, son.” Lonnie Quick’s bottom lip bulged, damp pieces of chewing tobacco speckling his beard. “You sure ain’t telling me how to take care of my own horse, are you?”
“Yep. That’s what I’m telling you.” Brody’s muscles tensed with the need to lash out, to punch someone or something. The anger inside raged like relentless artillery day and night. But at times like this, it took a battering ram to his chest and demanded to be let loose.
He fisted his fingers, half hoping Quick would kick the horse again. Give him a reason to teach the snake-blooded foreman a thing or two about how to treat a mustang.
Stirrup Ranch’s buster—like too many others—was of the mind to rough break wild horses—roping, blindfolding, and then saddling the green broncs without so much as a howdy-do. That kind of buster preferred to dig in with spurs, slam with a quirt, and fight it out. The rough-breaking methods rarely produced a good horse.
Which was probably why Quick’s mustang was giving him a heap of trouble.
Quick glanced at Brody’s balled-up fists then to his busted lip and black eye. The evidence from the last brawl was fading, but his reputation for packing a wallop was only growing.
Trouble was, Flynn got his bristles up every time Brody was in a fight, telling him it was bad for ranch business. Flynn had bawled him out something fierce earlier in the week for his sour attitude. And when Brody yelled back that he would leave the ranch and take his attitude with him, Flynn’s shoulders deflated.
“Don’t want you leaving, Brody.” Flynn’s voice had been drenched with enough sadness to douse a fire. “I’m just worried about you. Worried you’re going on the warpath for every blasted thing so you can punish yourself.”
Brody could admit he’d wanted to die a hundred times over during those early months after Newt’s passing. He’d taken the loss of his best friend hard, blamed himself, hadn’t wanted to go on, hadn’t cared about recuperating, even though Flynn and his wife, Linnea, had done everything they could to help bring him back to life.
He’d been a difficult patient for those long weeks they stayed in New York City with Linnea’s family. He’d been belligerent and resistant, and tried to end it all. If not for sweet little Flora . . . he wasn’t sure he would have made it.
But after living in South Park for the past year and a half, he was beyond all that now. Wasn’t he? Or was Flynn right? Was he still trying to punish himself?
He cocked his head, his sights homing in on Quick’s revolver. Did he actually hope to get shot?
Naw, he couldn’t leave Flora. At three and a half, his niece needed him. He wasn’t about to chance getting killed and leave her heartbroken.
Besides, he’d told Flynn after their last argument that he’d try harder to control himself. He didn’t want to embarrass Flynn and Wyatt and cause trouble for their ranch after how hard they’d worked to build it up over the past five years. With their land combined, his older brothers had the largest spread in South Park and one of the biggest in all of Colorado.