Rocky Mountain Cowboy (33 page)

Together they turned to look at the rapidly burning
fire thirty feet in front of them. The heat it generated was horrendous. No amount of water was going to save the barn. It and everything in it, all the tack and feed and equipment, would be lost. The only consolation was that the horses had been saved. It was a crippling tragedy.

As they exited the side corral, t
he fire trucks came into view, speeding over the crest of the hill, red lights flashing, sirens screaming.

“You okay?” Hawk looked
down at her, his soot-ringed eyes making a thorough sweep over her body, from head to toe. He even turned her to look at her back.

Jenny nodded and coughed. “I’m okay. You?”

“I’ll live.” His face was black with soot and his shirt singed. Smoke clung thickly to him as she was sure it did to her. He hadn’t been burned by some miracle, but his voice was hoarse and filled with barely suppressed fury. His eyes glittered hotly with it, and his body was clenched and tight.

“Let the medic look you over, then go inside. I’ll wind things up here.”

Jenny didn’t know what to say to him at the moment. She knew as well as he did what this disaster would mean to them. Even with insurance, this was a major setback so close to winter. Thoroughly disheartened, she walked over to the paramedic vehicle that followed the big fire truck into the yard.

The
efforts of the fire department and their heavy-duty hoses saved the enormous haystack in the yard, as well as the other outbuildings. Sparks shot up from the burning barn, but failed to threaten the house because of the way the breeze was blowing. Still the firefighters sprayed down the roof. Hawk, Eli, Hank, and Steve worked alongside the half dozen men in uniforms to ensure the blaze was completely put out.

After a shower, Jenny watched from her second story window. Tears filled her
burning eyes and streamed down her cheeks. This was such a huge loss. On top of everything else, it was staggering. How would Hawk deal with this? Dear God, he didn’t deserve this! It just wasn’t fair! She’d bet every dime she had this was deliberately set. And because it was probably arson, their insurance company wouldn’t cover the loss until they found out who caused the fire. That could take months, if they were ever able to discover who had set the fire. Knowing the way Brad covered himself, there may never be any evidence found.

She spent a long time thinking about what she could do to help Hawk out of this latest disaster, and what he’d even let her do. When she heard him come upstairs and turn on the shower, she went downstairs to
prepare two cups of herbal tea. She added a little brandy and honey to the tea, thinking it would soothe the their throats as well as their nerves. On the way back up the stairs with her tray, she recalled how happy they’d been to see each other again after their recent separation. They’d taken their time coming back from Denver and had a really nice dinner together. They’d kissed and hugged and touched and looked forward to falling into bed together for the first time in nearly a week. They should be wrapped in each other’s arms right now. The fact that such a happy moment had turned into such a terrible disaster brought fresh tears to her eyes all over again.

In her bedroom, she found Hawk seated on the edge of her bed. He was
clad only in his pajama bottoms. Bare-chested, with his elbows braced on his knees, he had his head bent, cradled in his hands, his fingers splayed through his long damp hair. He looked so disheartened, so beat, it broke Jenny’s heart.

She set her tray of tea on the night stand, and went over to kneel in front of him. She took his hands in hers. He looked down at her. The smell of smoke had vanished, but he looked really tired. She ran her hands and eyes over all his bare skin, then his face, making sure he wasn’t burned anywhere.

“We lost the whole barn. There was nothing the firemen could do to save any of it by the time they arrived. Eli and Hank said it went up like a matchstick.” His voice was raspy and thick. Jenny hated the discouragement she heard in it.

“We’ll rebuild it— just as good as before.” He and her father had been so proud of the job they’d done on that barn. It had cemented their partnership, and been a symbol of their joint efforts to improve the ranch. She understood what its loss meant to Hawk, emotional
as well as financial. She could help him with the latter, but she wouldn’t press the issue tonight.

She pointed to the tray she’d left on the
table. “I brought you some brandy laced tea.”

He moved to sit back against the headboard and took the cup of tea she handed him. Then she joined him on the bed with her own.
Silence settled between them while they finished their tea.

Finally, setting his cup aside,
Hawk spoke. “I feel like going over to the Caldwell place and beating the crap out of Brad.” His fists clenched in his lap. “I think it might be worth getting arrested for.”

Jenny laid her hand over his, fingers splayed wide in comfort. “No, it wouldn’t.” She wasn’t going to let Brad ruin them. “You better get some sleep.”

He leaned over and turned off the table lamp, then slid down under the quilt with her at his side. “The fire inspector will be out tomorrow to look through the ashes to determine the cause of the fire. I’d appreciate it if you’d follow him around and see what he finds. I have to cull the rest of the herd.”

“No problem.” She wanted to help him anyway she could. She hated to see him like this. “What else can I do?”

He turned to her in the dark. She could see him shake his head negatively. “I don’t know, Jenny. I just don’t goddamned know anymore. I think I’m fresh out of solutions.”

She pulled him into her arms and held onto him tightly. “We’ll get through this, together, just like you and Dad would have done.”

It was the only solace she could offer him without upsetting him, but it must have been enough because within minutes, he fell asleep in her arms.

∞∞∞

All week
, Jenny was kept busy. First, it was the fire investigator. She nearly wept in front of him when she saw the devastation in the bright light of day. It was nothing now but charred timbers and muddy ashes. The inspector was sympathetic. He answered all her questions and shared his findings with her. He promised her a copy of his report as soon as it was done, but he left her in no doubt that it had been a deliberate act of arson. Whoever had set the fire had left a gasoline can behind, either out of carelessness or necessity. It was now as black and charred as what it had ignited. The only thing he couldn’t tell her was who had set the fire.

He strung yellow plastic tape around the debris and told her not to let anyone go near the scene, then told her that he’d notify the sheriff since it appeared to be a crime scene.

He suspected the sheriff would send someone out to further investigate. She did know arson was a felony, didn’t she? Of course, she told him as she walked him to his vehicle. And if they could only get some evidence on Brad Caldwell, wouldn’t it be wonderful if they could charge him with a felony, she thought to herself as the inspector drove away.

Once lunch was over,
she called the insurance company. After listening to her appraisal of the situation, the first thing the agent said was that he would contact the fire department for their report. She did know, didn’t she, that if the fire department said it was arson, they could not cover the damage until it was determined who set the fire and why. It wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility that a property owner would set a fire to collect insurance money. She understood the company had to be assured this wasn’t the case here, didn’t she? By then, her patience was nearly gone. She replied curtly that a rancher would have to be a real moron to burn his horses out of their winter shelter, especially with winter only weeks away. Furious and frustrated, she hung up on the unsympathetic claims adjustor.

Eli came into the kitchen
just as she finished. “How about a cup of coffee?”

Jenny couldn’t seem to drum up a smile for her old friend.

Eli poured them both a cup and sat down across from her at the table. “I take it there won’t be any insurance money to build a new barn any time soon.”

“I doubt it. They want to be assured we didn’t burn down the barn ourselves.” She was thoroughly disgusted with the idea. “As if! What’s Hawk going to do? He doesn’t have the money for a new barn. The bank won’t lend him more money now, and there’s no way these extra jobs will bring in enough to cover the cost of rebuilding it.”

“He’s plannin’ on puttin’ up lean-tos when he gets back.”

“If he’d let me, I could give him the money to rebuild the barn. I could even make the loan payments and probably pay-off the equipment loan, too. Mother left me some money
, and I’ve made more off of investing it. It would be divine justice to use it on Daddy’s ranch.”

Eli grinned. He had been here when her mama had left Tom and taken his precious daughter with her, all at the urging of Tom’s mean and wealthy father-in-law. “It would be justice,” he agreed. “Whether it’d be divine or not, I can’t tell ya. But I do know that grandfather of yours would probably turn over in his grave to see his money end up invested in this place.”

“But Hawk doesn’t want my money,” she responded dejectedly. “He won’t let me help.”

“He feels like this is all his fault. Wants to fix it by himself.”

“His fault? That’s crazy.”

Eli shrugged. “Brad has always been his problem— his thorn in the side.”

She didn’t understand. She shook her head. “Well, partners help each other out, not leave one another to resolve trouble by themselves.”

Eli shrugged. “I expect he wants you to be proud of him, not bailin’ him out.”

Jenny tried hard to understand Hawk’s reasoning over the next few days. He was a proud man, but there were times in anyone’s life when, despite their best efforts, they needed help; when problems got too big to tackle alone.

That bit of wisdom felt sadly ironic to her. She’d spent years alone after being separated from her father; years when there had been no one to help her deal with her feelings of anger, loneliness, and vulnerability.

Hawk had come close to despair last night. She’d been there, too, once long ago and even more recently after
her father’s death. She was surviving and coping because of Hawk. She wasn’t going to let this new setback destroy him.

The cattle buyer showed up the following day. The stock they were selling had been sorted into holding pens next to the scales. Eli and Steve handled moving the animals through the pens and chutes, onto the scales, while Jenny and Hank recorded and logged their weight beside the buyer.

It took all day to get the three hundred and forty head of cattle weighed. The tabulation at the end was a good one. They got a little more than expected. The buyer was more than fair, giving them a good price per pound for their beef. The cattle they’d sold had put on some weight over the summer. All in all, Jenny and Hank and Eli were pleased. Steve sat on the fence watching and listening, his handsome face expressionless.

Jenny looked over at him and wondered what he was thinking as he observed their happy high-fives. Maybe he felt left out. Hank and Eli had been with the
ranch a long time. They were like family. Steve had never really fit in that way. He didn’t seem to want to fit in that way.

But Hawk was the one who really should have been here with them celebrating a good sale.
He was on another of his hunting trips. Market day was the culmination of a year’s worth of hard work on a ranch. It was what everyone worked towards. Their big once-a-year payday. If not for all the damages and setbacks this year, the sale would have been more than enough to cover expenses for another year. As it was, sadly, it wouldn’t be enough to keep the wolf from the door, so to speak.

That didn’t dampen Jenny’s high spirits, though, so after accepting the check the buyer handed her, she made arrangements with him to begin the shipping process the next day, then invited everyone up to the house for a drink. All, except Steve, accepted.

It would feel good to give Hawk some positive news when he got home. He’d only been gone two days. He had two more to go, and she missed him like crazy. In bed, warm and comfortable, she thought about him sleeping at the chilly line cabin and tromping through the mountains. She imagined him sitting with his corporate clients at night, not having much in common to talk about, except deer hunting.

He was probably worrying about how he was going to fix things; how he was going to replace a burned out barn. The first snowfall could
arrive any day. Where would he put his horses, his sick animals, his feed and tack? They could probably clear out the old barn, but what condition would all the farm equipment be in next spring?

For the hundredth time, she wondered what Hawk would say if she fixed things? How angry could he get? He was backed up against a wall. She had to approach him one more time about letting her help financially.

Another investigator from the fire department returned on Friday. He gathered ashes and debris and, of course, the burned gasoline can. When he was finished, he removed the yellow crime scene tape and left, promising to get back to her as soon as he had any further information. Jenny had no idea how fingerprints would survive such an inferno and therefore didn’t hold much hope in actually getting lucky enough to get a name attached to their arsonist. But she supposed anything was possible, even an occasional miracle.