The McClane Apocalypse Book 4 (13 page)

“You don’t need…”

“I know,” she says, interrupting him
with a grin. “I want to.”

Later in the evening when the work is
done, they’ve all eaten a meal that filled their bellies with
nourishing foods and Celeste and Helen have fallen asleep in his
sleeping bag, Cory lies awake listening to the wolves and coyotes
and other predators making meals of the carcass and guts of the
bear.

That bear had probably been
the biggest predator in these parts. He could’ve become its prey.
Cory is fairly
certain
that had been its plan, especially when it had
flanked him. Reaching over, he feels the child’s head and breathes
a sigh of relief when she doesn’t scorch his hand. He doesn’t know
much about how to help sick people or how to keep a kid alive. His
skills are slightly narrower in scope. If these two need defended
in a battle, he’s more adept for that. Sick
kids
and talkative mothers aren’t
his
specialty
.

Not able to sleep, he rises, leaves
his shotgun on the ground next to Helen in his den, mounts his
horse bareback and heads back to town to find the men who had lured
this young mother and her ill daughter to their own den under the
false promise of helping them. The night’s still young, the moon
full and the fresh snow will make tracking them easy. The most
lethal predator in these parts is on the hunt.

Chapter Seven

Sam

They gallop across the
pasture, she and Simon, racing for the barn at a speed not safe
with so much snow on the ground. Her pant legs will be
covered
with
slush and mud. It doesn’t matter. When they arrive, Simon
jumps down first before she even has one foot on the ground. They
both secure their mounts to the hitching post at the horse barn.
The day is overcast and gray, miserable and cold.

They sprint to the big house as
quickly as they can. She slips once and almost goes down. Simon
grabs her arm to steady her. They don’t take off their dirty, wet
and muddy boots but blast through the back door right into the
kitchen, startling Sue.

“Good heavens!” she exclaims. “What’s
going on?”

Sam looks at the counter,
taking in the cutting boards and Hannah’s handiwork. It
looks
like they
are making beef stew for dinner. Lots of work,
stick-to-the-ribs
kind of
comfort food.

“We need Doc and Reagan!” Simon
blurts. “Something got to one of the pregnant mares. She’s all torn
up.”

Sam jumps in to clarify as John
strolls into the kitchen, “John! Where are Grandpa and
Reagan?”

“They went over to the Reynolds.
They’re looking at two of their cows that are ready to calve any
day. Wayne wanted them to check them out. They’ve had problems with
sickness getting their cows lately,” he answers. He’s holding
papers in his hand. The men have been working on plans for cabin
additions and also some improvements on the clinic in
town.

“No!” Sam cries. “Sierra is
hurt, John. She looks like she was attacked by
something,
and she must’ve run
and she ran into the wire fencing and she’s really hurt and stuck
in the fence and freaking out!” Sam says on one breath.

“Let me get my coat,” John replies
calmly. “Hey, Kelly, we’ve got a mission, bro!”

He calls this to the other
room where Kelly must be watching Mary and some of the other
children. Sam can hear them giggling. He’s probably tossing them
into the air or playing on his hands and knees giving them “pony
rides” or playing hide and seek. He’s always playing with the kids.
And the kids are nuts about him, especially his precocious
two-year-old
. He
comes into the room carrying his daughter on his massive shoulders.
Mary holds on by using Kelly’s thick hair as handlebars.

Simon adds, “We found her all tangled
up in the fence when we were riding patrol. She’s way out there,
too, near the perimeter.”

“Let’s roll,” Kelly says,
places Mary
on
her bottom on the island and grabs his winter coat.

“Simon, Sam, go grab us some horses,
ok?” John says. “We’re gonna need fence tools. Meet you at the
barn.”

“Grab my bag for me, please, John,”
Simon asks.

He means his medical bag, Sam knows.
Grandpa gave it to him two years ago for his birthday.

She and Simon jog to the
barn and split up. Within a few minutes, they’ve caught two horses.
These are the ones that John and Kelly usually ride, a tall bay
gelding for Kelly and a chestnut mare for John. Sam works on
their
tack
while Simon grabs veterinary supplies out of the cabinets. He
joins her a few minutes later, and they finish prepping the horses,
as John and Kelly come into the barn.

The four of them ride out at a fast
pace to find the mare. She’s still where Sam and Simon had left
her, tangled, panting, near death with fear.

“Aw, shit,” Kelly says as they
dismount and approach.

John says, “This one’s pregnant,
too.”

The horse has stopped her screaming
and has resorted to soft nickers and whimpers. Sam kneels in the
snow near her head. She’ll try to keep her calm while the men work
to free her. She tunes out the guys as they go about their task and
instead tries to focus on the frightened mare. She strokes her head
soothingly, concentrating on her forehead. Her large, round eyes
stare up at Sam trustingly and with absolute fear for her
life.

“Shh, Sierra,” Sam croons. “It’ll be
ok now. We’re going to help you, girl.”

Her answer is another soft nicker.
This is one of Sam’s favorite mares. She hasn’t ridden her for some
time since she’s near the end of her pregnancy. She hopes the baby
doesn’t die because of the trauma to its mother, or the mare who is
gentle and sweet.

“Sam, give me a hand,” Simon requests
near the mare’s neck. “Put some pressure against this rag. She’s
got a very deep laceration there. Let’s see if we can’t get it to
slow down before moving her.”

Sam crawls through the snow to where
Simon indicates and pushes down on the rag. She doesn’t want to
apply too much pressure. The pain must be nearly unbearable.
Sierra’s going to need stitches here. She’s going to need stitches
just about everywhere. Her stomach is bleeding heavily on the
underside which is exposed to them as she lies on her right
side.

Kelly and John nearly have
her cut free. Sam feels so
sorry
for her. She’s going to have to
walk back to the barn. There’s no way for any of them to transport
her any other way.

Simon is wiping away blood, applying
bandages and cleaning her wounds as quickly as he can possibly
manage. His hands are covered in blood, but he doesn’t seem to
notice or care. He’s even removed his coat, which is now laying in
the snow near him. His pants are soaking through like hers from the
snow. John cuts the last strand of gnarled and twisted barbed
wire.

“She’s free,” he declares. “Whether
she can get up or not is another thing altogether.”

“We’ll have to help her. She’s too
weak from exertion,” Simon tells them.

“Let’s get her on her feet and back to
the barn if we can,” Kelly says.

They all line up on the
other side of the mare, on the other
side
of what’s left of the mangled
section of fence. On the count of Kelly’s three, they all shove and
rock her. It doesn’t do much. She’s heavier than
normal
with
carrying the baby. On the second try, the
mare
realizes that they are
trying
to help her
and is able to
help
them in return. She gets to her feet,
stumbles
once but
stays up. Her long legs are shaking from the trauma.

“This fence
needs repaired
,”
John observes. “We’ll stay out here and you guys get her back. I’ll
run up to the Reynolds and get Doc and Reagan.”

“John, look,” Kelly says, pointing to
tracks in the snow.

They all look more closely.

John says, “Coyote? Looks
too big to be
coyote
.
Looks
like more than one.
Wolves?”

“Not sure,” Kelly
says,
clearly
puzzled. “We’ll get Doc out here later to have a
gander.”

Simon explains, “The way she has claw
marks and the gut injuries, I’d almost say something like a cat.
Mountain lion?”

“I don’t know,” John admits. “Don’t
think mountain lions are native to Tennessee, but heck, maybe they
are now.”

“We’ve got a perimeter check to do
later,” Kelly says with steely resolve.

“Good job, guys,” John says, praising
them. “You did great. I don’t think she would’ve made it much
longer.”

She and Simon nod and
turn
with
their horses’ reins in their hands. Simon clips a lead rope
onto the injured mare’s halter and tugs gently. She limps terribly
from the pain of her injuries. Sam winces with her every
falter
.

They make it to the barn with some
sort of blessed luck and get her safely tucked into a clean
stall.

“I’ll take care of
the
tack
,
Simon,” Sam offers. “Just look after her.”

“Thanks,” he agrees and turns toward
her stall.

Sam gets both of their
trail mounts
untacked
and brushed down. She turns them out to pasture.
By this time, some of the other horses have gathered near the barn.
They sense one of their own is in pain and is down.

“Can you fetch me some hot water from
the house or cow barn, Sam?” Simon asks.

“On it,” Sam says, jogging away with
two empty pails.

She rushes to the house,
back
into
the kitchen where Sue and Hannah fill the buckets with hot
water from the tap. They stuff more strips of rags into her coat
pockets before she heads out again. When she gets to the mare’s
stall, Simon is standing outside of it holding his
shoulder.

“What happened?” she
says
on
a
gasp.

“She kicked me,” he
explains.

“Oh, Simon!” Sam exclaims with
concern. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, it’s cool,” he says.
“I’m
fine
.
She’s just in pain. It’s not her fault.”

She reaches for him, but he shrinks
back, still holding his shoulder. His eyes tell her of his pain,
which in turn causes her to feel pain in the pit of her stomach out
of concern for her friend.

“I said
I
’m fine,
”
he says testily and pushes away from the wall.

Sam is hurt by his
rejection but nods. They both enter the mare’s stall. This time Sam
holds the horse’s halter, keeping her head pointing toward
Simon,
who is
working on patching together her wounds on her stomach. A horse has
a tendency to kick in the opposite direction of where it is
looking. This way if she kicks again, she’ll kick with her back
right leg and hit the stall wall instead of him.

Simon injects a few of the
wound sites with a numbing solution he must’ve loaded into the huge
animal syringe. The mare jumps every time he plunges the
needle
into
her flesh. Sam doesn’t blame her. If someone tried poking her
with that thing, she’d probably kick or pass out or cry. He has
three of the gashes sewn up, the wounds cleaned with the rags
soaked in the hot water and covered with medicinal salve by the
time Reagan and Grandpa appear at the stall door.

Grandpa walks directly over to stand
next to Simon. He doesn’t try to take over but calmly pushes his
glasses a little further up onto the bridge of his nose. He’s
inspecting Simon’s work.

“Good job, son,” Grandpa says to him
and lays a hand on Simon’s shoulder.

It’s the same shoulder he’d
been holding a short while ago from the mare’s kick. Simon
winces
, although
Grandpa doesn’t notice.

“She’ll need antibiotics, wouldn’t you
say?” he asks of Simon.

Grandpa strokes the mare’s
neck to soothe her as Simon works. Reagan, on the other hand, jumps
right in to help. The mare has gash marks and
an enormous chunk of
flesh
hanging from her right flank and another smaller wound on her
chest.

Simon answers, “Yes, sir. I think so,
too. Will it hurt the foal she carries?”

“I don’t think so. It’s better to err
on the side of caution with this. She’s due to deliver any day.
She’s going to need her strength to nurse a baby.”

“Right,” Simon agrees and just keeps
working.